HX64076830 

RA1231.L4  H184     Lead  poisoning  in  th 


U.  S.  DEPARTMENT  OF  LABOR 
BUREAU  OF  LABOR  STATISTICS 


ROYAL  MEEKER,  Commissioner 


BULLETIN  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES  /  iVffuni  x:    -.^^ 

BUREAU    OF    LABOR    STgg^]gi^—    \^ff°,^^l   {Q^ 

INDUSTKIAX     ACCIDENTS      AHDHyciENF     I^^TilTTrT^ 


LEAD  POISONING  IN 
THE  MANUFACTURE  OF 
STORAGE    BATTERIES    . 


DECEMBER    15,  1914 


WASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT  PRINTING  OFFICE 

191S 


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T^Altv^/'l^ 


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U.  S.  DEPARTMENT  OF  LABOR 
BUREAU   OF   LABOR   STATISTICS 


ROYAL  MEEKER,  Commissioner 


BULLETIN  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES*            "     (WHOLE    1/?C 
BUREAU    OF    LABOR    STATISTICS^     '    '    '     i  NUMBER    10 J 

INDUSTRIAL 

ACCIDENTS      AND       HYGIENE      SERIES: 

No.       6 

LEAD    POI  SON  I  NG 

I  N 

THE 

MANUFACTURE 

OF 

STORAGE    BATTERIES 

DECEMBER    15,   1914 

\S7ASHINGTON 

GOVERNMENT  PRINTING  OFFICE 

1915 


COiNTENTS. 


Lead  poisoning  in  the  manufacture  of  storage  batteries:  Pago. 

Introduction 5-7 

Processes  in  the  making  of  storage  batteries 7-16 

Casting  or  molding - ' 7-9 

Trimming  grids 9, 10 

Mixing  the  oxides  for  Faure  plates 10 

Making  the  paste 10, 11 

Pasting  plates - 11-13 

Drying  pasted  plates 13 

Forming  or  pickling 13, 14 

Assembling  and  lead  burning 14-16 

Finishing 16 

Hygienic  conditions 16-19 

Sanitary  equipment 18 

Medical  care 19 

"Wages,  duration  of  employment,  etc , 19,  20 

Lead  poisoning  in  the  industry 20-32 

Sources  of  information  concerning  the  poisoning: 22,  23 

Number  of  cases  in  five  large  factories 23-25 

Type  of  lead  poisoning 25-27 

Lead  poisoning  in  the  industry  in  Great  Britain  and  Germany 27-32 

Summary , 32-34 

Appendix  A. — Regulations  in  Great  Britain  for  the  manufacture  of  electric 

accumulators 35-37 

Appendix  B. — General  provisions  of  the  French  law  governing  th*^  man- 
ufacture of  electric  accumulators 38 

LIST  OF  PHOTOGRAPHS. 

.Facing  page — 

Plate    1.  Casting  room  in  large  American  factory 8 

Plate    2.  Casting  grids  by  hand 9 

Plate    3.  Mixing  lead  oxides ' 10 

Plate    4.  Paste  mixing  by  hand [Backing  plate  3] 

Plate    5.  Paste  mixing  by  machine 11 

Plate    6.  Filling  ironclads 13 

Plate    7.  Cleaning  lugs  and  edges  of  pasted  plates  by  machine  vrith  guards  and 

exhaust 14 

Plate    8.  Cleaning  lugsand  edges  of  pasted  plates  without  exhaust  [Backing 

plate  7]. 

Plate    9.  Assembling  and  cleaning [Following  plate  8] 

Plate  10.  Lead  burning 15 

Plate  11 .  Charging  room 16 

3 


BULLETIN  OF  THE 
U.  S.  BUREAU  OF  LABOR  STATISTICS. 


WHOLE  NO.  165.  WASHINGTON.  DECEMBER  15,  1914 


LEAD  POISONING  IN  THE  MANUFACTURE  OF  STORAGE 

BATTERIES. 

BY    ALICE     HAMILTOX,    M.    A.,    M.   D. 

INTRODUCTION. 

The  making  of  storage  batteries,  or  electric  accumulators,  as  tliey 
are  called  in  every  country  except  our  own,  is  increasing  in  extent 
and  importance  everyAvhere.  It  is  regarded  as  a  very  dangerous 
lead  trade. and  the  Governments  of  Great  Britain  and  other  Euro- 
pean countries  have  made  strict  regTilations  as  to  the  sanitation  of 
places  in  which  such  work  is  done  and  as  to  the  methods  to  be  em- 
ployed in  thencj^  since  experience  has  shown  that  in  the  absence  of 
regulations  lead  poisoning  among  the  workers  is  a  very  serious  evil. 

In  the  United  States  there  are  five  large  factories  where  storage 
batteries  are  made,  one  in  Cleveland,  Ohio;  one  in  Depew,  N.  Y. ;  one 
in  Suspension  Bridge,  N.  Y.;  and  two  in  Philadelphia,  Pa.  A  great 
many  smaller  plants,  employing  from  5  to  15  men  each,  are  scattered 
throughout  the  country,  and  many  automobile  factories  -now  have 
their  own  storage-battery  departments.  There  are  also  estabhsh- 
ments  where  no  new  batteries  are  made  but  where  old  ones  are 
reassembled  and  recharged.  Railway  companies  usually  have  small 
plants  for  recharging  the  batteries  used  for  train  hghting.  As  a  rule 
the  smaller  factories  are  rather  neglected  and  dirty,  more  so  than 
are  the  larger  ones.  The  largest  factory  in  the  country  has  branches 
in  several  cities  to  which  are  shipped  the  plates  ready  for  use-  and 
these  are  then  assembled  into  batteries  in  the  branch  estabhshments. 

A  storage  battery  is  described  as  a  collection  of  secondary  cells, 
or  accumulators,  which,  when  once  charged  by  an  electric  current, 
may  be  used  for  some  time  as  the  source  of  electricity. 

The  original  type  of  storage  battery,  known  as  the  Plante,  consists 
of  lead  plates,  which  are  usually  corrugated  or  perforated  to  offer  a 
larger  surface  for  the  chemical  action  of  the  charging  current.  The 
Faure  cell  was  constructed  with  the   purpose   of  hastening  these 

5 


6  BULLETIN"    OF    THE    BUREAU    OF    LABOE    STATISTICS. 

cliemical  changes.  Faure  plates  are  covered  with  a  paste  of  lead 
oxides,  the  positive  plate  with  red  lead  or  a  mixture  of  red  lead  and 
litharge  (rarely  with  pure  litharge)  and  the  negative  plate  usually 
with  litharge.  Sometimes  a  Faure  negative  is  paired  with  a  Plante 
positive  plate.  Both  Plante  and  Faure  plates  are  ''formed"  by  the 
passage  of  an  electric  current,  the  effect  of  which  is  to  change  the 
metallic  lead  of  the  Plante  positive  plate  and  the  lower  oxides  of  the 
Faure  positive  plate  to  a  higher  oxide  of  lead,  the  brown  peroxide, 
while  at  the  same  time  the  surface  of  the  negative  plate  is  reduced 
to  spongy  metallic  lead.  During  the  discharge  of  the  electric  cur- 
rent the  reverse  takes  place,  and  a  certain  amount  of  lead  sulphate 
is  formed  also,  so  that  an  old  storage-battery  plate  is  covered  with 
a  mixture  of  the  sulphate  and  the  lower  oxides. 

For  many  years  such  cells  were  the  only  ones  used  for  storage 
batteries,  but  of  late  the  nickel-iron  battery  of  Edison  (the  so-called 
alkaline  battery)  has  been  introduced  and  is  said  to  be  coming 
rapidly  into  general  use.  In  this  battery  the  positive  plate  consists 
of  perforated  steel  tubes  filled  with  nickel  hydrate,  the  negative  of 
perforated  steel  pockets  filled  with  iron  oxide.  They  are  immersed  in 
a  bath  of  potassium  hydroxide  and  charged,  the  nickel  in  the  posi- 
tive plate  being  changed  to  black  nickel  oxide  and  the  iron  oxide  of 
the  negative  to  spongy  iron.  ' 

Edison  batteries  are,  therefore,  free  from  lead,  but  the  Plante  and 
Faure  are  lead  batteries  and  their  manufactuire  involves  the  ex|)osure 
of  workmen  to  the  dangers  of  lead  poisoning.  There  are  many  proc- 
esses in  the  making  of  these  batteries  which  are  attended  with  the 
formation  of  lead  fumes  or  metallic  lead  dust  or  lead  oxide  dust  and 
in  which  the  workman's  hands  and  clothes  become  covered  with  these' 
substances.  First,  there  is  the  casting  or  molding  of  the  ''grid,"j 
or  plate,  from  molten  lead  which  has  usually  a  small  percentage  of 
antimony  added.  For  Plante  cells  the  grid  is  cast  m  ridges  and 
furrows,  or  it  may  have  roughened  markings  on  the  surface,  or 
spaces  filled  with  rosettes  of  lead  ribbon.  Faure  grids  are  made  in 
such  shape  as  to  hold  large  quantities  of  lead  oxide  paste.  The 
gxid  v/hen  it  comes  from  the  mold  is  straightened  and  the  irregular 
edges  are  trimmed  smooth  by  hand  or  by  machine.  Then  the  grids 
for  the  Faure  batteries  must  be  covered  with  paste,  and  for  this  pur- 
pose red  lead  and  litharge  are  weighed  and  mixed  dry  and  then 
worked  up  with  a  hquid,  usually  dilute  sulphuric  acid.  This  also 
may  be  done  either  mechanically  or  by  hand.  The  resulting  paste  is 
rubbed  and  pressed  into  the  interstices  of  the  leaden  grids  and  the 
pasted  plates  are  dried,  assembled  in  pairs  of  positive  and  negative, 
unmersed  in  dilute  sulphuric  acid,  and  subjected  to  the  action  of  an 
electric   current.     This    is   known    as    "foi-mmg,"    and    the   formed 


LEAD  POISOiSrils^G  IIST   MAXUFACTUEE   OF   STOEAGE  BATTEEIES.  7 

plates  are  then  washed  clean  of  acid,  dried,  and  made  up  into  battery 
cells.  To  do  this  the  pairs  of  plates  must  be  assembled  into  large 
or  small  groups  and  bound  together  by  means  of  pure  lead  which 
is  melted  with  an  oxyhydrogen  flame,  a  process  called  lead  burning. 
Then  another  electric  current  is  passed  through  the  cells  to  ''charge" 
them,  and  finally  the  men  known  as  the  "finishers"  place  them  in 
receptacles  of  acid  and  fasten  on  the  outer  connectors  with  pure 
molten  lead. 

This  is  a  general  description  of  the  work  in  a  storage-battery  fac- 
tory, but  it  will  be  necessary  to  take  it  up  more  in  detail,  for  there 
are  many  ways  of  carrying  out  the  different  processes,  some  of  which 
are  more  dangerous  than  others.  In  the  following  sections  the  proc- 
esses are  given  in  their  logical  sequence,  not  in  the  order  of  then* 
occurrence  as  one  passes  from  room  to  room  in  any  one  factory. 
Often  in  the  smaller  plants  all  the  work  is  carried  on  in  one  room, 
but  in  the  five  largest  the  dift'erent  steps  are  separated  to  a  certain 
extent.  Forming  and  charging  are  always  done  in  special  rooms  in 
these  larger  factories;  weighing  and  mixing  oxides  and  compounding 
paste  are  usually  separated  from  the  rest  of  the  work;  this  is  some- 
times true  of  pasting;  and  casting  and  trimming  the  grids  and 
assembling  and  lead  burning  the  plates  are  generally  carried  on  in 
one  or  more  large  rooms,  together  with  the  making  of  Plant e  plates 
and  the  final  "fijiishing." 

PROCESSES  IN  THE  MAKING  OF  STORAGE  BATTERIES. 
CASTING  OR  MOLDING. 

There  has  been  a  good  deal  of  controversy,  especially  among  the 
Germans,  over  the  presence  of  lead  fumes  in  the  air  around  the  casting 
kettle  of  a  storage-battery  plant.  Wutzdorf  ^  holds  that  fumes  escape 
in  the  course  of  the  work  of  casting  grids  even  when  the  lead  is  not 
much  above  450°  C.  (842°  F.).  Wagener  -  also  beheves  that  fumes 
arise  from  the  melting  pot,  and  he  calls  attention  to  the  appearance  of 
blue  clouds  whenever  the  workman  stirs  the  contents  of  the  pot.  The 
tests  made  by  the  factory  inspectors* in  the  Hagen  factory,  where  the 
kettles  are  furnished  with  hoods,  showed  that  even  with  that  protec- 
tion lead  escaped  into  the  air,  for  clamp  filter  paper  suspended  above 
the  casting  benches  showed  the  presence  of  particles  of  lead.  British 
factory  inspectors  assume  that  there  may  be  an  escape  of  fumes  from 
any  molten  lead  which  is  exposed  to  the  air,  and  they  insist  on  precau- 
tions being  taken  accordingly. 

In  American  factories  the  lead  used  in  casting  is  supposed  to  be 
decidedly  below  the  fuming  point,  but  if  one  watches  the  work  of  a 

1  Arbeiten  aus  dem  kaiserlichen  Gesundheitsamte,  1S98,  vol.  15,  pp.  154-170. 

2  Deutsche  VierteljahrsscTirift  fui-  affentliche  Gesundheitspflege,  1902,  vol.  34,  pp.  529-578. 


8  BULLETIN    OF    THE    BUEEAU    OF    LABOR    STATISTICS. 

molder  one  can  see  that  thougli  there  are  no  visible  fumes  as  long  as 
the  lead  is  undistui'bed  there  are  quite  perceptible  bluish  fumes  when 
the  dross  is  skimmed  or  the  lead  ladled  out.  These  fumes  are  in  all 
probability  the  lowei  oxides  of  lead  in  a  state  of  very  fme  division  and 
are  therefore  very  poisonous.  The  analyses  of  air  made  for  the  New 
York  Factory  Investigating  Commission  ^  by  Dr.  C.  T.  Graham 
Kogers  and  John  Vogt,  B.  S.,  shov\^  that  in  the  storage-battery  fac- 
tories in  that  State  there  is  sometimes  lead  in  the  air  around  the 
molting  pot.  They  found  3.4  milligrams  of  lead  in  1  cubic  meter  of 
air  in  the  casting  room  of  a  plant  which  had  no  exhaust  over  the 
pots  and  1  milligram  in  a  second  place  where  the  kettles  were  weU 
hooded.  As  an  adult  breathes  about  4.5  cubic  meters  of  air  (hiring 
10  hours,  this  would  indicate  that  a  man  in  the  first  factory  might 
breathe  15.3  milligrams  of  lead  during  his  day's  work  and  a  man  in  the 
second  4.5  milligrams,  25i'ovided  this  contamination  of  the  air  were 
constant  and  not  accidental.  In  that  case  a  man  employed  in  the 
casting  room  of  the  first  factory  would  run  serious  risk  of  lead  poison- 
ing, if  it  is  true,  as  Teleky  says,-  that  a  daily  dose  of  10  milligrams  for 
several  weeks  may  lead  to  severe  acute  poisoning. 

The  molder  stands  close  to  the  kettle,  skimming  dross  and  ladling 
lea'd  into  the  molds.  The  dross  he  usually  throws  on  the  floor  beside 
the  kettle  and  walks  to  and  fro  over  it  as  he  works,  grinding  some 
of  it  into  dust,  which  contaminates  the  air. 

The  accompanying  illustrations  show  how  conditions  may  vary 
between  casting  rooms.  The  first  (pi.  1)  represents  a  casting  room 
in  one  of  the  five  large  factories  visited.  The  kettles  are  hooded, 
the  hoods  being  connected  with  flues  which  carry  off  the  fumes  from 
the  molten  lead.  The  floor  is  reasonably  clean,  and  the  room  dis- 
plays an  evident  intention  to  reduce  the  inevitable  dangers  of  the 
work  to  a  minimum.  In  the  second  (pi.  2)  conditions  are  much 
less  satisfactory.  The  kettle  is  unhooded,  the  open  window  beside 
it  being  relied  upon  to  carry  off  the  fumes.  The  dross  and  lead 
scraps  on  the  floor  are  much  in  evidence.  It  is  easy  to  see  hoM^-  as 
the  men  go  about  their  work  this  lead  refuse,  is  ground  iato  the 
wooden  flooring  until  cleaning  the  latter  m  any  satisfactory  fashion 
is  a  practical  impossibility. 

The  danger  in  the  casting  room  is  in  proportion  to  the  number  of 
kettles,  the  presence  or  absence  of  hoods  with  exhausts  over  the 
kettles,  the  degree  of  care  which  is  used  in  handling  the  dross,  and 
the  separation  of  this  work  from  other  dangerous  processes,  for,  in 
many  factories,  pasted  plates  are  handled  in  this  room  and  the 
dust  of  the  dry  oxide  paste  is  thus  added  to  the  metalhc  dust.  Work 
in  the  casting  room  is  sometimes  made  very  disagreeable  by  the 

1  Second  report  of  the  New  York  State  Factory  Investigating  Commission,  vol.  2,  pp.  1129  and  1131. 

2  Protokoll  der  Sitzung  des  grossen  Rates  deslnstitutsfiir  Gevrerheliygicne,  1912,  A.  Seydel,  Berlin,  p.  1.5. 


LEAD  POISONI^^G  IN   MANUFACTUEE   OF   STORAGE   BATTERIES.  9 

methods  used  in  preparing  the  molds  to  receive  the  molten  lead. 
For  instance,  in  one  plant  visited  the  molds  are  dusted  with  very 
finely  ground  soapstone,  used  in  such  quantities  that  the  room 
looks  hke  a  flour  mill,  while  the  men  are  powdered  like  millers.  In 
another  jets  of  smoky  acetylene  gas  are  passed  over  the  molds  till 
a  layer  of  carbon  has  formed,  and  the  result  is  an  atmosphere  black 
with  smoke. 

Wutzdorf  ^  draws  attention  to  the  danger  of  arsenic  in  the  fumes 
from  the  melting  pots  in  the  casting  room,  for  the  lead  that  is  used 
may  contain  an  appreciable  quantity  of  arsenic.  He  quotes  some 
analyses  made  by  Fischer,^  which  show  that  the  arsenic  present  in 
hard  or  antimonial  lead  may  run  from  0.16  to  7.9  per  cent.  A 
smelting  expert  in  the  United  States  is  authority  for  the  statement 
that  no  antimonial  lead  in  this  country  is  quite  free  from  arsenic. 

TRIMMING  GRIDS. 

For  convenience  in  handling,  grids  are  often  cast  in  pairs  and 
then  sawn  apart  by  a  machine  which  may  have  no  protection  or 
may  be  furnished  with  a  glass  or  celluloid  screen  to  keep  the  particles 
fiom  flying  in  the  workman's  face.  The  edge  of  the  grid  must  be 
smoothed  and  the  superfluous  lead  cut  or  filed  away,  either  by  hand 
or  machinery.  In  some  places  this  work  is  very  slight  in  amount, 
but  in  others  there  is  a  great  deal  of  it.  For  instance,  one  plant 
was  visited  in  which  16  boys  were  trimming  edges  with  big  knives, 
while  in  another  plant  almost  as  large,  there  were  only  two  hand 
trimmers;  the  rest  of  the  work  was  done  by  machinery  and,  since 
the  grids  were  cast  with  clean  edges,  not  much  of  it  was  necessary. 

There  is  a  handle  on  the  grid  which  projects  from  the  battery 
and  forms  part  of  the  connecting  system,  the  leaden  connectors 
being  fastened  on  here.  This  is  called  the  ''lug,"  and  in  the  case  of 
small  grids  the  lug  is  cast  in  one  piece  with  the  body  of  the  grid, 
but  in  the  case  of  large  grids  it  must  be  burned  on  to  the  body. 
The  work  of  lug  burning  is  also  done  in  the  casting  room. 

The  casting  of  Plante  plates  differs  somew^hat  from  the  method 
just  described.  Usually  lead  from  a  large  kettle  is  run  into  a  great 
flat  moid  and  the  resulting  thick  sheet  of  pure  lead  is  rolled  out  by 
machinery  tiU  it  is  ^ery  thm.  Plates  are  cut  from  this  sheet  and 
ridges  and  furrows  are  then  cut  into  them  by  machinery.  This  is 
called  ''spinning"  or  "swedging"  and  is  done  with  an  abundance  of 
oil  or  water  to  keep  down  the  heat;  incidentally  the  dust  also  is  kept 
down.  Another  common,  variety  of  Plante  plate  is  the  Manchester,. 
which  consists  of  a  frame  of  antimonial  lead  with  interstices  into 
which  rosettes  of  lead  ribbon  are  pressed. 

1  Arbeiten  aus  dem  kaiserlichen  Gesundheitsamte,  1S9S,  vol.  15,  pp.  160-161. 

2  See  Ilandbueh  der  chemisehen  Technologie,  von  Dr.  Ferdinand  FLsc^ier,  Leipzig,  1893,  S.  272. 


10  BULLETIN    OF    THE   BUREAU    OF    LABOR    STATISTICS. 

The  men  wlio  handle  the  Plante  plates  are  exposed  to  oxide  dust 
to  a  certam  extent  after  the  plate  has  been  formed. 

MIXING  THE  OXIDES  FOR  FAURE  PLATES. 

Up  to  this  point  the  workmen  have  been  exposed  only  to  metallic 
dust  and  possibly  to  fumes  from  the  kettles,  provided  the  processes 
described  have  been  carried  on  in  rooms  separate  from  those  in  which 
operations  involving  the  making  or  handling  of  paste  or  pasted 
plates  are  performed. 

The  trimmed  grids  for  Faure  cells  must  next  be  covered  with  a 
paste,  the  composition  of  which  is  a  trade  secret,  but  the  essential 
elements  of  which  arc  the  oxides  of  lead.  It  is  generally  said  that 
dilute  suli:)huric  acid  is  used  for  moistening  the  oxides,  but  some  paste 
rooms  reek  with  ammonia  fumes,  showing  that  ammonia  may  enter 
into  the  composition  of  the  paste. 

Usually,  mixing  the  dry  oxides  for  the  paste  is  done  with  some  pre- 
caution against  dust.  Plate  3  is  an  illustration  of  the  mixing  of 
oxides  by  hand  without  precautions.  In  one  plant  the  weighing, 
dumping,  and  mixing  all  go  on  under  cover  and  are  controlled  by  a 
workman  who  stands  outside  the  inclosuro  and  works  through  a 
window  in  the  waU.  In  another  of  the  larger  plants  there  is  a  similar 
method  of  dumping  the  oxides  under  cover,  but  it  is  so  carelessly 
managed  that  though  the  room  is  new  and  the  mixer  weU  covered, 
the  place  is  full  of  oxide  dust.  In  a  third  the  work  is  done  in  the  open 
but  carefully  and  with  exhausts  over  scales  and  mixers,  so  that  the 
room  is  very  clean. 

In  a  fourth  large  plant  the  mixing  is  carried  on  at  one  end  of  the 
pasting  room.  There  is  no  exhaust  over  scales  or  mixer  and  the 
litharge  or  red  lead  is  simply  scooped  up  from  the  kegs  and  dropped 
into  the  scales,  which  are  then  emptied  into  the  mixer.  At  the  time 
this  place  was  visited  a  worlonan  was  engaged  in  mixing  oxides,  and 
clouds  of  yellow  dust  were  perceptible.  In  one  of  the  smaller  plants 
also  the  oxides  were  being  weighed  on  unprotected  scales  and  mLxed 
in  an  open  chaser  directly  beside  the  pasj:ing  table. 

The  accompanying  illustration  (pi.  4)  shows  the  process  of  mixing 
paste  by  hand.  The  mixmg  takes  place  under  glass  cabinets  con- 
nected with  a  large  flue,  the  exhaust  in  which  is  supposed  to  carry  off 
the  dust.  Nevertheless  a  coating  of  dust  is  plainly  visible  on  the 
platform  on  which  the  mixers  stand  and  on  the  benches  and  utensils 

near  them. 

MAKING  THE  PASTE. 

By  far  the  safest  way  is  to  have  all  the  paste  made  up  in  a  special 
room  and  given  to  the  men  who  then  apply  it  to  the  grids.  Id  this 
way  only  a  few  men  come  in  contact  with  the  dry  oxides.  This 
method  is  followed  in  three  of  the  five  largest  plants,  but  in  the  other 


PLATE  3.— MIXING  LEAD  OXIDES. 

Tho  v/ork  is  done  partly  by  hand,  partly  in  a  primitive,  churn-like  machine.    There  is  no  device 
tcr^rcmoval  of  the  dust  which  is  formed  in  weighing,  in  filling  the  mixer,  and  in  emptyingthe 


PLATE  5.— PASTE  MIXING   BY  MACHINE  WITH    DUST-PROOF  FUNNEL. 

The  oxides  are  admitted  from  an  overhead  bin  and  mixed  without  necessitating  opening  the 

machine. 


LEAD  POISOXIXG  11^   MAXUFACTUEE  OF   STORAGE   BATTESIES.       11 

two  the  dry  oxides  are  made  into  paste  in  the  pasting  room.  In  one  of 
the  latter  four  or  six  men  make  up  the  powder  into  paste  by  hand^ 
working  at  a  table  with  a  glass  case  and  an  exhaust.  At  the  time 
this  place  was  visited  the  floor  near  the  paste-mixing  table  was 
covered  thickly  with  scarlet  dust  and  the  mixers'  overalls  and  shoes 
were  scarlet.  Three  cases  of  lead  poisoning  were  found  which  had 
been  contracted  at  this  table  during  1913.  The  dust  is  also  a  menace 
to  the  pasters  who  work  in  the  same  room.  The  other  plant  has  an 
even  worse  method,  for  here  the  dry  oxides  are  weighed  in  open 
scales  in  quantities  for  the  pasters,  each  of  whom  must  make  up  his 
own  paste.     There  are  no  exhausts  at  these  pasting  tables. 

In  the  three  plants  where  the  paste  is  made  for  the  men,  paste 
mixing  is  done  in  a  special  room.  Bread-kneading  machines  are  used 
for  this  purpose  in  one  (see  pi.  5),  and  in  another  the  paste  is  mixed 
in  large  mortars  beside  each  of  which  is  an  exhaust.  Neither  of  these 
plants  is  above  criticism  in  the  conduct  of  this  part  of  the  work,  for 
the  rooms  are  far  dustier  than  they  should  be  and  one  is  in  an  ex- 
tremely neglected  condition.  The  third  plant  has  a  fahly  clean 
mixing  room  with  a  cement  floor  which  can  be  flushed  with  water, 
but  the  man  who  makes  the  litharge  paste  has  a  dangerous  habit  of 
throwing  handfuls  of  dry  litharge  over  the  tray  which  is  waiting  for  the 
paste,  as  a  baker  would  flour  a  pan  to  keep  the  dough  from  sticking. 

Wagener  ^  says  that  when  the  making  of  paste  and  the  pasting  of 
plates  were  carried  on  in  the  same  room  in  the  Hagen  factory,  20  out 
of  27  men  in  that  room  had  lead  poisoning,  but  a,fter  the  two  processes 
were  separated  only  10  out  of  the  same  number  were  poisoned.  He 
also  gives  the  results  of  certam  changes  in  a  Cologne  factory,  where, 
in  addition  to  separating  the  pasting  from  the  mixing,  the  pasting 
tables  were  furnished  with  glass  cabinets  and  exhausts,  this  being 
necessary  because  the  pasters  sometimes  had  to  add  dry  oxide  to  the 
paste.  Before  the  introduction  of  these  protective  measures  there 
were  37  cases  of  lead  poisoning  among  153  pasters;  afterwards  there 
were  9  among  194,  and  the  following  year,  only  8  among  209. 

PASTING  PLATES. 

Pasters  v/ork  at  tables  which  may  be  covered  with  glass  and  fur- 
nished v/ith"  projecting  wooden  rims,  or  of  wood  with  a  glass  plate  laid 
on  it,  or  simply  of  wood  with  no  glass.  Of  course,  glass  is  by  far  the 
best  because  it  can  easily  be  cleaned  at  the  end  of  the  day's  work, 
while  wood  becomes  impregnated  with  the  oxides  and  can  not  be 
scrubbed  clean.  It  is  desirable  to  have  a  raised  rim  around  the  edge 
of  the  table  to  keep  the  paste  from  dropping  on  the  floor. 

There  is  a  great  difference  in  the  pastes  used  in  the  different  plants, 
and  the  same  plant  may  use  several  kinds.     Sometimes  the  paste  is 

1  Dentscbe  Viertel jatosschrift  f iir  oflentliche  Gesandheitspflfige,  1902,  vol .  34,  p.  550. 


12  BULLETIN    OF    TPIE    BUREAU    OF    LABOR    STATISTICS. 

decidedly  moist  a,nd  takes  some  time  to  diy  and  become  dusty;  again, 
it  may  be  so  dry  as  to  crumble.  There  are  pasters  who  wear  leather 
or  rubber  gloves  and  use  wooden  spatulas  to  rub  the  paste  into  the 
grid;  but  the  majority  wear  no  gloves  and  many  Ivnead  the  paste 
with  their  fingers.  It  is  doubtful  whether  gloves  afford  much  pro- 
tection, for  so  many  men  have  a  habit  of  taking  them  off  and  then 
putting  them  on  again  over  dhty  hands. 

In  three  large  plants  the  pasting  tables  are  furnished  with  an 
exhaust  system,  though  in  one  of  the  three  this  is  installed  only  at  the 
tables  for  red  lead  paste,  not  for  the  litharge.  The  arrangement  con- 
sists in  an  opening,  wide  or  narrow,  along  the  far  edge  of  the  table 
opposite  the  paster  or  along  the  right-hand  edge,  with  a  board  pro- 
jectmg  over  it  and  an  exhaust  behind  it.  Such  an  exhaust  is  of  very 
doubtful  value,  as  the  wet  paste  on  the  table  is  not  in  itself  a 
source  of  danger.  In  no  case  was  it  possible  to  see  any  dust  arising 
from  the  paste  which  was  under  manipulation.  The  danger  comes 
from  the  paste  that  has  fallen  and  dried  on  the  edges  of  the  table,  on 
the  floor,  and  on  the  men's  clothes,  and  the  exhaust  can  not  catch  up 
dust  from  these  places.  Pasting  rooms  are  always  scarlet  and  yellow 
from  red  lead  and  Utharge  dust,  though  they  are  supposed  to  be 
cleaned  every  night.  The  part  of  the  room  devoted  to  litharge  paste 
never  looks  as  dusty  as  the  part  devoted  to  red  lead,  because  the 
latter  is  such  a  vivid  color,  while  litharge  is  about  the  color  of  wood 
and  does  not  show  on  tables  and  floors.  One  supermtendent,  how- 
ever, said  that  he  had  more  trouble  with  lead  poisoning  from  the 
litharge  paste  than  from  the  red  lead;  he  thought  it  was  dustier  when 
it  dried  than  red  lead. 

Rogers  and  Vogt^  found  in  one  pastmg  room,  just  over  the  table, 
4.2  milligrams  of  lead  in  a  cubic  meter  of  air,  and  in  a  second  1.2 
milligrams.  These  quantities  mdicate  that  in  the  first  factory  it 
might  be  possible  for  a  man  to  breathe  in,  during  the  day's  work, 
18.9  milligrams,  and  in  the  second  5.4  milUgrams. 

The  dust  in  the  pasting  room  is  increased  where  the  men  are 
allowed  to  throw  on  the  floor  strips  of  paper  covered  with  paste; 
these  soon  dry,  and  as  the  men  walk  back  and  forth  over  them  the 
dry  paste  is  ground  into  dust.  This  is  seen  in  factories  where  the 
process  of  drying  the  plates  is  hastened  by  pressing  strips  of  paper 
on  them  much  as  one  would  use  a  blotting  paper.  These  papers 
must  be  pulled  off  and  then,  covered  with  oxides  as  they  are,  they 
are  sometimes  thrown  on  the  fl_oor  to  be  gathered  up  at  the  end  of 
the  day.  In  two  plants,  however,  they  are  dropped  into  receptacles 
so  that  they  do  not  spread  the  dust  as  they  dry. 

One  kind  of  plate  is  known  as  the  ''ironclad."  This  is  a  light 
grid  made  of  slender  parallel  rods  of  metal  over  each  of  which  is 

1  Second  Report  of  the  New  York  State  Factor}-  Investigating  Commission,  vol.  2,  pp.  ll:?9  and  1131. 


LEAD  POISONING  IN   MANUFACTUEE   OF   STORAGE   BATTEEIES.        13 

slipped  a  very  loosely  fitting  rubber  tube  with  narrow  openings  in 
its  circumference.  The  grid  is  placed  upright  on  a  table  uncier  a 
glass  case  and  dry  red  lead  is  forced  into  the  spaces  between  the 
rubber  tubes  and  the  rods,  the  grid  bemg  violently  shaken  all  the 
time  to  shake  the  red  lead  down.  It  is  an  extremely  dusty  process 
and  in  spite  of  the  protection  of  the  glass  case,  there  were  heaps 
of  dust  all  around  the  place  in  the  one  plant  in  which  these  plates 
are  made  (see  pi.  6).  One  man  working  at  the  machme  for  filling 
these  grids  had  his  face  powdered  with  red  lead  and  the  red  color 
could  be  seen  in  his  nostrils.  The  full  grid  is  taken  to  another  table 
which  also  is  provided  with  a  glass  case,  is  place.d  m  a  frame,  and  the 
end  is  fitted  on,  and  the  connectors  burned.  This  second  table  was 
of  wood,  with  wide  cracks,  and  there  were  quantities  of  dust  over  it 
and  over  the  floor.     From  this  table  the  plates  go  to  the  acid  tank. 

DRYING  PASTED  PLATES. 

The  pasted  plates,  if  they  are  small,  may  go  at  once  to  the  tanks 

in  the  ''forming"  or  ''pickling"  room,  but  large  ones  are  usually 

dried  first  because  the  acid  in  the  pickhng  trough  penetrates  more 

quickly  if  the  paste  is  dry.     This  drying  is  done  either  in  a  separate 

room  or  on  racks  in  the  pasting  room.     When  the  plates  are  dry 

their  surface  has  set  Hke  cement  and  is  hard  and  firm,  yet  they  can 

not  be  handled  without  raising  dust,  the  shelves  on  wliich  they  rest 

are  always  covered  with  dust,  and  the  men  who  take  them  ofi^  the 

racks  and  carry  them  to  the  assembling  room  have  a  very  dusty 

piece  of  work.     When,  as  is  often  the  case,  the  drying  cabinets  are 

in  the  paste  room,  this  makes  another  source  of  air  contamination 

in  that  room. 

FORMING  OR  PICKLING. 

The  forming  room  is  large  and  usually  well  ventilated,  filled  with 
long  troughs  of  dilute  sulphuric  acid  in  which  are  immersed  large 
numbers  of  plates,  connected  by  a  copper  bar.  A  current  of  elec- 
tricity is  sent  through  the  plates,  and  when  they  are  taken  out  they 
have  been  "formed"  and  the  positive  one  is  covered  with  a  coating 
of  the  brown  peroxide,  the  negative  with  gray,  spongy  lead.  In 
the  forming  room  and,  to  a  slighter  extent,  in  the  charging  room 
where  a  second  treatment  with  an  electric  current  takes  place,  the 
fumes  of  sulphuric  acid  are  strong  enough  to  cause  much  discomfort 
to  a  person  not  accustomed  to  them.  Nevertheless  the  men  working 
there  do  not  seem  to  experience  any  irritating  efl'ect  upon  the  eyes 
and  throat,  and  German  factory  inspectors  say  that  physicians  find 
no  increase  in  lung  trouble  or  in  inflammation  of  the  eyes  among 
these  men.     Chyzer,^  how^ever,  after  an  examination  of  some  Aus- 

1  Annales  d'hygiene  publique  et  de  medecine  legale,  1908,  4th  series,  Vol.  X,  pp.  239-260.. 


14  BULLETIN    OF    THE    BUEEAU    QF    LABOE    STATISTICS. 

trian  factories  gained  quite  a  difTereiit  impression,  and  in  order  to 
decide  the  question  lie  subjected  rabbits  to  an  atmosphere  similar 
to  that  in  forming  rooms.  He  found  that  there  was  enough  sul- 
phuric acid  in  such  air  to  cause  bronchitis  and  even  foci  of  inflam- 
mation in  the  lung  tissue  of  animals.  The  bubbles  which  are  always 
rising  from  the  acid  troughs  carry  with  them  tiny  drops  of  acid,  and 
Chyzer  found,  in  a  forming  room  with  open  wmdows,  a  deposit  af 
1.28  grams  of  sulphuric  acid  on  one  square  meter  of  surface.  In  a 
room  with  closed  windows  the  cpantity  on  a  surface  of  this  extent 
was  3.97  grams.  The  workmen,  he  found,  often  suffered  from  bron- 
chitis and  nosebleed  and  the  acid  fumes  also  exerted  an  injurious 
effect  on  the  enamel  of  the  teeth.  On  the  other  hand,  Bottrich,  one 
of  the  physicians  to  the  Hagen  factory,  behev-es  that  these  acid  fumes 
are  actually  beneficial.  None  of  the  physicians  interviewed  in  the 
course  of  the  present  study  had  noticed  any  ailment  among  the  men 
traceable  to  their  occupation  in  the  forming  room. 

When  the  formed  plates  are  taken  from,  the  acid,  they  are  washed 
and  soaked  in  various  solutions,  the  composition  of  which  is  f.lways 
a  trade  secret,  but  the  work  is  of  no  apparent  importance  from  the 
writer's  point  of  view. 

ASSEMBLING  AND  LEAD  BLTRNING. 

Tlie  dusty  processes  begin  again  in  the  assembling  room  where 
the  formed  plates  are  grouped  and  fastened  together  by  lead  strips. 
A  group  of  positive  plates  is  then  fitted  together  with  a  group  of 
negatives  and  between  each  pair  of  plates  is  shpped  a  thin  strip  of 
wood.  This  work  is  known  as  assembling  and  the  men  as  assem- 
blers. Lead  burning  consists  in  fasterdng  the  groups  together  and 
connecting  positive  and  negative  groups  by  a  soldering  process  in 
wliich  pure  lead  is  used  instead  of  ordinary  solder,-  and  the  heat  is 
apphed  by  means  of  an  oxyhydrogen  flame.  This  is  done  in  the 
same  room  as  the  assembhng  and  the  two  &re  often  spoken  of  together 
as  assembhng,  or  the  work  of  the  whole  department  may  be  designated 
as  lead  burning.  This  makes  it  difficult  to  find  out  exactly  what 
Idnd  of  work  was  done  by  a  man  employed  in  such  a  room.  Other 
occupations  are  frequently  carried  on  in  the  assembhng  rooms,  such 
as  the  inspection  of  formed  plates  before  they  go  to  the  assemblers, 
the  imperfect  ones  being  rejected,  or  straightened,  trimmed,  and 
filed.  Small  plates  wliich  have  been  pasted  in  pairs  are  sawn  apart 
in  tliis  room  and  both  the  trimming  and  sawing  are  productive  of 
a  great  deal  of  dust  because  the  plates  are  now  covered  with  diy 
oxides.  The  cleaning  of  the  edges  and  the  lugs  of  pasted  plates  is 
another  dusty  piece  of  work  usually  carried  on  here.  The  projecting 
part  of  the  plate,  known  as  the  lug.  and  the  edges  of  the  plate  have, 


PLATE  8.— CLEANING  LUGS  AND  EDGES  OF  PASTE  PLATES  WITHOUT  ANY  EXHAUST. 


LEAD  POISOinNG  IN   MAiS^UFACTUKE   OF   STORAGE   BATTERIES.       15 

ill  the  process  of  pasting,  become  more  or  less  smeared  with  paste 
and  in  order  that  good  connections  may  be  made  this  dried  oxide 
must  be  cleaned  off  and  the  metal  brushed  and  scraped  till  it  is 
bright.     The  work  may  be  done  by  hand  or  by  machine. 

The  accompanying  illustrations  (pis.  7,  8,  and  9)  show  the  oper- 
ations of  cleaning  and  assembHng.  The  machine  shown  in  plate  7 
is  carefully  equipped  to  reduce  the  danger  to  the  worker  as  much  as 
possible.  In  spite  of  the  exhaust,  however,  an  accumulation  of  dust 
and  bits  of  paste  is  seen  beneath  the  machine.  Plate  8  shows  the 
method  of  cleaning  plates  by  hand,  in  which  the  worker  has  either 
no  i^rotection  at  all  or  only  such  as  is  given  by  a  respirator.  Plate 
9  shows  conditions  when,  as  is  often  the  case,  cleaning  and  assembling 
are  carried  on  in  the  same  room. 

The  assemblers  proper  handle  dry  oxide  plates,  but  not  in  such  a 
way  as  to  cause  the  production  of  much  dust.  The  lead  burnei-s 
have  work  which  German  and  English  authorities  consider  particu- 
larly dangerous.  They  use  a  small  but  very  hot  oxyhydrogen  flame 
to  melt  a  narrow  bar  of  pure  lead  (see  pi.  10).  The  question  is  how 
much  volatihzation  of  lead  is  caused  by  the  tiny  flame.  As  we  shall 
see  later,  the  most  recent  British  reports  show  more  lead  poisoning 
among  the  lead  burners  than  among  any  other  workmen  in  the 
electric  accumulator  factories,  and  British  factory  inspectors  are 
advising  the  installation  of  air  exhausts  at  the  work  benches  to  protect 
these  men.  The  German  factory  inspectors  also  report  a  rate  of 
lead  poisoning  among  burners  in  certain  factories  even  higher  than 
that  among  pasters,  and  they  have  shown  by  means  of  pieces  of 
moist  filter  paper  suspended  above  the  lead  burner  that  lead  passes 
into  the  air.^ 

Roth,  however,  questions  the  interpretation  of  these  tests.  He 
repeated  them  and  found  that  when  the  workman  was  engaged 
only  in  lead  burning  there  was  no  appreciable  lead  caught  on  the 
filter  paper,  but  when,  after  bm-ning,  the  man  proceeded  to  polish 
the  surface  of  the  lead  with  a  steel  brush,  there  was  a  distinct  deposit 
of  lead  dust  on  the  paper.^ 

In  the  United  States  the  lead-burning  department  has  a  much 
better  reputation  among  physicians  and  workmen  than  has  the 
mixing  or  pasting  department,,  and  very  few  cases  of  lead  poisoning 
cduld  be  traced  to  it  in  the  plants  visited.  It  may  be  that  we  have 
so  much  more  sickness  in  our  pasting  and  mixing  rooms  that  the 
less  dangerous  departments  are  overshadowed.  Another  explana- 
tion was  offered  by  an  expert  familiar  with  the  industry  in  England 
as  well  as  in  this  country.     He  said  that  the  Enghsh  use  in  lead 

1  Jahresbericht  des  Regierungs-  und  Gewerberates  fiir  die  Regierungsbezirk  Armljerg  pro  1S96. 

=  neitrage  zur  pathologischn  Anatomic  und  allgemeinen  Pathologie  VII  Supplement  1905,  S.  1S4-197. 


16  BULLETIN    OF    THE   BUEEAU    OF    LABOR    STATISTICS.  j 

bui-ning  a  pure  oxyliydrogen  flame,  while  the  Americans  use  hydrogen 
mixed  with  atmospheric  air  in  which  the  oxygen  is  greatly  diluted. 
The  pure  oxygen  makes  a  much  hotter  flame  and  therefore  causes 
more  volatihzation  of  lead.  The  source  of  lead  dust  noted  by  Roth,  \ 
the  pohshing  of  the  hardened  lead  ^vith  a  steel  brush,  was  not  seen 
in  any  lead-burning  room  visited  in  the  course  of  this  inquiry. 
Eogers  and  Vogt  were  able  to  demonstrate  in  one  factory  2.6  milli- 
grams of  lead  per  cubic  meter  in  the  air  over  a  lead  burner's 
bench,  and  1.8  grams  in  another,^  but  in  view  of  the  many  dust- 
producing  processes  which  are  carried  on  in  those  assembhng  rooms, 
it  is  impossible  to  estimate  how  much  of  the  lead  represented  vola- 
tilized oxides  and  how  much  dust. 

FINISHING. 

This  term  is  a  little  confusing,  for  it  is  used  bot-h  for  the  trimming 
and  polishing  of  grids  in  the  casting  room  and  for  the  final  making 
up  of  batteries.  In  this  report  it  is  used  in  the  latter  sense  only. 
The  plates  wdiich  have  been  assembled  and  burned  together,  go 
next  to  the  charging  room  for  the  passage  of  the  second  electric 
current.  The  accompanj'ing  illustration  (pi.  11)  shows  the  method 
of  charging.  The  room  in  wliich  this  oj)eration  is  carried  on  is 
like  the  forming  room  except  that  the  acid  fumes  are  less  strong. 
The  plates  are  then  brought  to  the  finishers  who  place  them  in  ceUs 
filled  with  acid  and  fasten  on  the  covers  and  the  outer  connectors, 
thus  making  up  the  batteries.  The  only  lead  work  here  is  making 
the  coim.ectors  on  the  outside  of  the  battery.  This  is  essentially 
the  same  as  lead  burning,  for  it  is  done  ^vith  pure  lead  and  the  oxy- 
hj'drogen  flame. 

Small  plates  are  placed  in  hard-rubber  containers,  medium-sized 
ones  in  glass  and  large  ones  in  wooden  boxes  lined  with  sheet  lead. 
The  making  of  these  lead-hned  containers  is  similar  to  lead  burning, 
the  edges  of  the  lead  sheets  being  welded  together  by  the  oxyhydro- 
gen  flame.  It  maj^  be  done  in  the  assembling  room  or  in  the  room 
for  casting  Plante  plates.  One  foreman  called  attention  to  the  fact 
that  in  making  the  largest  of  these  containers,  the  bm^ner  was 
obhged  to  put  his  head  inside  it  or  he  would  not  be  able  to  make 
accurate  joinings,  and  of  com'se  the  sHghtest  leak  would  spoil  the 
battery.  If  there  reaUy  are  fumes  produced  in  such  lead  burning, 
the  workman  can  not  avoid  inhaling  them. 

HYGIENIC  CONDITIONS. 

An  inspection  of  the  storage-battery  establishments  in  this  coun- 
tiy  gives  one  the  impression  that  only  lately  have  the  employers 
awakened  to  the  dangerous  character  of  the  work  they  have  been 

1  Second  Report  of  the  Xe-.v  York  State  Factorj-  Investigating  Commission,  1913,  vol.  2,  pp.  1130, 1131. 


"^      — ■'-' 

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LEAD  POISONIiS'G  IN  MAXUFACTUEE  OF  STORAGE  BATTERIES.       17 

carrying  on,  and  tiiat  they  are  not  yet  well  enough  insjinicted  in  its 
dangers  to  recognize  all  the  places  that  should  be  safegiiarded,  nor 
to  appreciate  the  importance  of  personal  care  of  their  employees. 

Of  the  five  largest  plants  that  were  visited,  all  but  one  are  new 
and  well  built.  Cement  floors  were  found  in  three.  The  advantage, 
of  course,  of  a  cement  floor  is  that  it  can  be  thoroughly  cleaned, 
whereas  in  the  case  of  a  wooden  floor  the  powder  is  ground  into  the 
wood  and  into  the  cracks  between  the  boards  and  it  is  impossible 
to  get  all  of  it  out.  One  of  the  three  in  which  there  is  a  cement 
floor  is  cleaned  by  flushing  at  the  end  of  the  day.  The  second  has 
a  very  elaborate  vacuum-cleaning  system,  and  the  third  is  cleaned 
simply  by  sweeping  with  wet  sawdust,  because  the  cement  in  this 
factory  is  not  waterproof.  All  three  of  the  plants  are  fairly  clean  for 
the  most  part,  but  one  of  them  has  a  great  deal  of  dust  in  the  pasting 
room.  Of  the  two  lai-ger  plants  with  wooden  floors,  one  is  new,  and 
the  floors  are  still  smooth  and  reasonably  clean;  the  other  is  old,  the 
floors  are  worn,  the  dust  is  ground  into  them,  and  they  could  not 
possibly  be  made  dust  free.  In  this  last  plant  an  attempt  has  been 
made  to  improve  conditions  in  the  pasting  room  by  covering  the 
floor  thickly  with  damp  sawdust,  but  the  effect  is  rather  spoiled 
by  the  piles  of  oxide-covered  papers  thi'own  on  the  floor  after  being 
taken  from  the  pasted  grids.  This  last  plant  is  the  only  one  in 
which  there  is  overcrowding.  The  rooms  are  too  small.  In  aU  the 
others,  there  is  ample  space,  light  and  ventilation;  indeed  the  con- 
struction of  these  four  plants  is  better  than  then'  upkeep,  which  in 
no  instance  is  so  careful  as  to  secure  scrupulous  cleanliness. 

It  is  -quite  surprismg  to  an  outsider  to  see  how  a  manager  wiU  point 
with  pride  to  a  new  and  expensive  device  for  carrying  off  dust  through 
exhausts  and  will  quite  fail  to  see  the  dust  on  the  floor  where  he  is 
standing,  dust  which  needs  no  newer  or  more  expensive  equipment  for 
its  safe  removal  than  a  broom  and  a  pail  of  wet  sawdust. 

The  smaller  factories  differ  from  the  larger  chiefly  m  having  the 
different  processes  less  well  separated.  For  mstance,  in  one,  mixing 
oxides,  paste  makhig,  pasting,  forming,  and  lead  bm-ning  are  all  car- 
ried on  in  the  same  room,  leaving  only  the  casting  and  trimming  to 
be  done  in  a  small  room  oft'  the  main  one.  Repair  shops  have  another 
bad  feature  m  the  dust  from  old  rejected  battery  plates.  These  are 
usually  thrown  in  a  heap  ui  a  corner  until  enough  accumulate  to  be 
sold  to  a  refinery.  The  branch  establishments,  which  only  assemble 
batteries,  are  much  safer  than  the  factories  proper,  since  everything  that 
has  to  do  with  pasting  is  eliminated.  AssembUng  and  lead  burning 
and  the  final  finishing  are  the  dangerous  processes  here,  but  it  is  very 
much  easier  to  manage  the  dust  problem  in  such  a  place.  However,  in 
these  plants  there  is  also  a  certain  amount  of  work  with  old  batteries 
that  adds  an  element  of  dust. 
73764°— Bull.  165—15 2 


18  BULLETIX    OF    THE    BUEEAU    OF    LABOR    STATISTICS. 

SANITARY  EQUIPMENT. 

The  making  of  paste  and  the  pasting  of  f)lates  is  recognized  m  all 
the  larger  plants  and  in  most  of  the  smaller  ones  as  dangerous  work, 
and  though  the  employer  may  not  explam  this  fact  to  his  workmen  he 
almost  always  provides  some  kind  of  washing  facilities  for  men  en- 
gaged in  this  work.  The  work  of  casting  and  trimming  and  lead 
burning  and  assembling  is  regarded  more  lightly  by  the  employer, 
and  sometimes  the  men  employed  in  such  work  arc  not  provided  with 
any  place  where  they  can  wash. 

Two  of  the  five  largest  plants  have  paid  very  little  attention  to  the 
personal  care  of  their  men.  The  pasters  in  one  of  them  were  wearmg 
old  trousers  and  aprons  which  did  not  cover  their  shhts  so  that  when 
they  go  home  at  night  they  must  carry  red  lead  and  litharge  dust  in 
their  shirts.  The  only  provision  for  washing  is  a  sink  with  cold 
water;  if  the  men  want  hot  water  they  must  fill  the  sink  and  run 
steam  from  a  hose  mto  the  water  to  heat  it.  If  they  wish  soap  and 
towels,  they  must  pay  for  them.  In  the  other  plant  there  are  sinks 
with  only  cold  water  in  the  pasting  room,  but  it  is  said  that  the  men  can 
get  pails  of  hot  water  from  the  floor  below.  No  towels,  soap,  nail- 
brushes, or  overalls  are  provided,  and  there  is  no  lunch  room.  The 
mixers  and  pasters,  however,  are  given  leather  gloves.  In  a  third 
factory  conditions  are  better.  There  is  an  excellent  washroom  next 
to  the  pasting  room,  very  well  equipped  and  with  ventilated  lockers 
for  the  men's  clothes,  but  it  is  for  the  use  of  the  pastei-s  and  mixers 
only.  There  is  no  lunch  room  at  all.  A  fourth  factory  has  a  wash- 
room close  to  the  pasting  room  w4th  a  long  sink,  hot  water,  soap, 
toweLs,  and  nailbrushes.  Full  suits  of  overalls  arc  furnished  by  the 
compan}^  to  the  pasters  and  mixers.  When  noon  came,  durmg  the 
visit  made  to  this  plant,  the  men  from  the  pasting  and  mixing  depart- 
ment all  went  t.)  the  wash  room  at  once;  but  they  did  not  take  off  their 
dusty  overalls  l)eforc  eating  lunch,  and  no  lunch  room  is  provided  for 
them.  Only  one  of  the  five  plants  makes  really  abundant  and  satis- 
factory provision  for  the  personal  care  of  the  men,  and,  fortunately, 
this  is  the  largest  plant  m  the  country.  Here  there  are  modern,  well- 
equipped,  and  very  well  maintained  wash  rooms,  a  room  with  shower 
baths  and  a  large  pleasant  dining  room  and  recreation  room.  The 
men  may  buy  a  hot  dinner  in  the  lunch  room  and  the  company  regu- 
lates the  price  which  the  restaurant  keeper  may  charge.  Gas,  steam 
heat,  and  the  use  of  the  room  are  furnished  by  the  company. 

So  far  as  could  be  ascertained,  even  in  places  where  the  men  are  well 
cared  for,  they  do  not  seem  to  be  instructed  in  the  dangers  of  the  work, 
perhaps  from  fear  of  frightening  them  away.  Of  21  men  who  were 
asked  whether  they  had  ever  been  told  that  the  stuff  they  were  using 
was  poisonous,  only  2  replied  in  the  affirmative. 


LEAD  POISONING  IN   MANUi'\4.CTUKE   OF    SXOEAGE   BATTERIES.        19 

MEDICAL  CARE. 

Tlie  Ohio  law  requires  that  nieii.  in  this  employment  be  examined 
once  a  month  by  a  physician  employed  by  the  company.  Neither 
the  New  York  nor  the  Pennsylvania  laws  contain  this  provision  for 
employers  of  storage-battery  works,  but  there  are  ph3"sicians  attached 
to  the  two  large  New  York  plants  and  to  one  of  the  two  in  Pennsyl- 
vania. In  the  two  former  the  physician  takes  care  only  of  the  men 
who  apply  to  him  for  advice,  but  in  the  Pennsylvania  plant  the  ptiy- 
sician  makes  almost  daily  visits  and  regularly  examines  the  men  em- 
ployed in  the  more  dangerous  kinds  bf  work  and  also  the  apphcants 
for  work  in  these  departments.  He  suspends  from  work,  or  transfers 
to  other  departments,  men  whose  teeth  arc  in  bad  condition,  or  who 
are  physically  below  par,  and  the}^  are  not  allowed  to  return  until  he 
has  pronounced  them  to  be  in  fit  condition.  Men  found  to  be  alco- 
holic are  discharged.  This  physician  lays  special  stress  upon  the 
condition  of  the  teeth  as  a  contributor}-  factor  in  lead  poisoning. 

WAGES,  DURATION  OF  EMPLOYMENT,  ETC. 

The  men  employed  in  storage-battery  works  are  a  shifting  class, 
especially  the  pasters,  though  they  are  usually  paid  fairly  good  wages, 
.  soncietimes  decidedly  above  the  rate  ordinarily  paid  for  unskilled 
labor.  According  to  the  employers  men  in  this  trade  in  Ohio  receive 
from  $1.90  to  $3.50  a  d&j.  In  New  York  a  skilled  worker  at  a  machine 
in  the  casting  room  stated  that  he  had  earned  $21.90  a  week.  Pasters 
are  paid  less.  Three  pasters  in  New  York  gave  their  weekly  wa,ges  as 
$12,  |12  to  $13.50,  and  $13.75,  respectively.  A  fourth  paster  re- 
ceived $15.  Pasting  is,  usually,  piecework.  Two  men  emplpyed  in 
the  forming  room  received  each  $11  a  week.  The  books  of  one  large 
concern  in  Philadelphia  showed  that  pasters  were  paid  from  $14  to 
$1S  a  week.  The  wages  of  lead  burners  were  higher,  reaching  $19.50 
a  week.  Two  mixers  (the  mixing  in  this  factory  is  done  by  hand)  and 
one  man  who  acted  as  helper  to  a  lead  l)urner  said  that  they  were  paid 
only  $9  a  week. 

In  spite  of  reasonably  good  wages,  men  do  not  seem  to  remain  long 
at  the  work,  for  among  70  who  were  interviewed  only  17  had  worked 
as  long  as  a  year  and  41  had  worked  for  less  than  six  months. 

The  following  statement  shows  the  period  of  exposure  of  70  cases 
of  lead  poisoning  in  this  industry : 

Less  tliaii  1  month 3 

1  inontli  and  less  than  2  months 6 

2  and  less  than  3  ro^jnths 8 

3  and  less  than  4  months 11 

4  and  less  than  5  months 6 

5  and  less  than  6  months 7 

Total .  less  than  6  months 41 


20  BULLETIN    OF    THE    BUEEAU    OF    LABOE    STATISTICS. 

6  and  less  than  7  months 4 

7  and  less  than  8  months 1 

8  and  less  than  9  months 3 

9  and  less  than  10  months -  -  -  -  0 

10  and  less  than  11  months 2 

11  and  less  than  12  months -  -       - 

Total,  less  than  1  year 53 

1  year  and  less  than  2  years 8 

2  and  less  than  3  years 0 

3  and  less  than  4  years 2 

4  and  less  than  5  years 3 

5  and  less  than  6  years - 0 

6  and  less  than  7  years 2 

12  years 1 

13  years 1 

Total,  over  1  year 17 

The  majority  of  tlic  workmen  are  unskilled  foreigners,  and  the 
division  of  work  between  them  and  the  English-speaking  workers 
depends  largely  ujjon  the  degree  of  skill  required.  Lead  burning  is 
skilled  work,  and,  like  molding,  is  often  done  by  English-speaking 
men.  The  mixing  of  the  oxides  and  of  the  paste  is  under  the  control 
of  a  skilled  man,  and  the  making  of  Plante  plates  is  mostly  skilled 
work.  On  the  other  hand,  the  pasting,  assembling,  trimming,  and 
transporting  are  done  by  unskilled  foreigners.  In  other  words,  some 
of  the  dustiest  and  most  dangerous  of  the  processes  are  given  over  to 
unskilled  men,  who  often  do  not  understand  English.  A  good  many 
of  them  look  very  young,  and  in  some  factories  bo^^s  of  16  are  employed, 
especiallv  in  hand  trimming  and  in  assembling. 

LEAD  POISONING  IN  THE  INDUSTRY. 

In  casting  and  molding,  provided  the  room  is  separate  from  the  one 
in  which  paste  plates  are  handled,  the  only  danger  is  from  fumes  and 
possible  particles  of  metallic  lead.  In  trimming,  polishing,  and  filing 
the  molded  grid  only  metallic  dust  is  encountered,  and  this  is  far  less 
dangerous  than  lead  fume  or  oxide  dust,^  so  that  if  these  processes 
were  carried  on  in  a  separate  room  the  work  would  be  comparatively 
safe. 

Mixing  the  oxides,  making  the  paste,  and  applying  the  paste  expose 
the  men  to  the  action  of  red  lead  and  litharge,  and  the  danger  is  in 
proportion  to  the  amount  of  dust  produced.     Oxide  mixing  can  be 

1  The  oxides  of  lead  are  about  as  soluljle  in  human  gastric  juice  as  white  lead  (basic  carbonate),  but  the 
lower  oxides  are  lighter  and  more  fluffy  and  dustj-  to  handle,  so  that  some  authorities,  such  as  Etz  (Ley- 
mann's  Bekampfung  der  Bleigefahr  in  der  Industrie,  pp.  6,  7),  believe  that  litharge  causes  more  harm  than 
white  lead.  In  a  study  made  for  the  Bui-eau  of  Labor  (Bulletin  95,  White  Lead  Industry  in  the  United 
States,  p.  259)  it  was  found  that  in  factories  where  both  white  lead  and  the  oxides  were  manufactured  the 
men  engaged  in  the  oxide  department  had  a  higher  rate  of  lead  poisoning  than  those  in  the  white  lead. 


LEAD   POISOls'IlSrG  IN   MAXLTFACTUEE    OF    STOEAGE   BATTERIES.        21 

made  safe  by  properly  inclosing  the  dump  for  the  dry  powder  and  the 
machines;  the  same  is  true  of  paste  making.  Kubbing  the  paste 
into  the  grids  is  always  a  dangerous  piece  of  work,  but  if  the  paste  is 
very  moist  and  the  paste  rooms  kept  clean,  the  dangers  from  the 
work  are  minimized.  In  such  cases  the  important  thing  is  to  see 
that  the  workman  washes  at  the  end  of  his  work  and  leaves  his  working 
clothes  behind  him;  in  other  words,  to  see  that  he  does  not  get  the 
dust  into  his  mouth  with  his  food  or  tobacco,  nor  carry  it  home  in  his 
clothes.  But  if  the  paste  be  rather  dry  and  crumbly  and  the  tables 
and  floors  be  allowed  to  become  dusty,  no  care  in  the  matter  of  per- 
sonal cleanliness  will  really  save  the  men  from  lead  poisoning,  because 
they  will  breathe  in  the  dust.  Legge  and  Goadby  ^  advise  keeping 
floor  and  workbenches  in  the  paste  room  always  damp. 

After  the  plates  have  been  filled  with  paste  and  dried,  the  further 
processes  of  taking  them  out  of  the  drying  cabinets  and  carrying  them 
to  the  assembling  room,  assembling,  lead  burning,  placing  in  recep- 
tacles, and  finishing,  all  involve  exposure  to  a  certain  amount  of 
oxide  dust  from  these  plates,  as  well  as  exposure  to  fume  from  the 
use  of  the  oxyhydrogen  flame  on  pure  lead. 

The  report  of  the  New  York  State  Factory  Investigating  Com- 
mission states  that  out  of  67  cases  of  lead  poisoning  reported  among 
indoor  workers  in  that  State  during  one  year,  15  were  storage-battery 
workers.^  In  the  course  of  mvestigations  in  storage-battery  fac- 
tories. Dr.  Graham  Rogers  found  men  at  work  who  showed  typical 
signs  of  lead  absorption.  In  one  factory  three  cases  had  abeady 
been  reported  to  the  New  York  Department  of  Labor  and  in  addition 
to  them  Dr.  Rogers  found  three  boys  under  18  who  showed  typical 
anemia;  4  pasters  with  marked  pallor,  2  with  marked  anemia  and 
the  lead  line,  and  a  seventh  who  was  under  treatment  for  lead  poison- 
ing. Two  assemblers  were  found  with  symptoms  of  lead  poisoning 
and  a  lead  burner  with  anemia  and  a  lead  line.  The  mixer  showed 
evidence  of  plumb  ism.  The  regular  force  in  this  factory  engaged 
in  the  lead  processes  was  110  to  115  men. 

In  the  second  factory  13  cases  had  been  reported,  mostly  pasters. 
Dm^mg  Dr.  Rogers'  visit  4  cases  were  discovered  in  the  pasting  room 
and  the  greater  part  of  the  force  in  that  room  impressed  the  investi- 
gators as  showing  signs  of  lead  absorption.^ 

In  this  same  report  is  given  the  result  of  a  detailed  investigation 
of  31  cases  of  industrial  lead  poisonmg  traced  to  Niagara  Falls 
plants,  all  but  one  of  which  came  from  three  storage-battery  facto- 
ries.*    The  investigation  was  made  in  the  summer  of  1912  and  the 

1  Lead  Poisoning  and  Lead  Absorption,  London,  1912,  p.  282. 

2  Second  Report  of  the  New  York  State  Factory  Investigating  Commission,  1913,  vol.  2,  pp.  1128-1130. 

3  Ibid.,  p.  1132. 

4  Ibid.,  jjp.  583-GOl. 


22  BULLETII^    OF    THE   BUEEAU    OF    LABOK    STATISTICS. 

largest  number  of  cases  fall  in  the  year  1911.  In  that  year  there 
were  17  cases;  in  1912,  9;  in  1910,  3,  and  m  1909,  2.  There  are 
several  interesting  details  in  this  report.  Two  of  the  men  contracted 
lead  poisoning  while  inspecting  and  cleaning  plates;  in  5  out  of  the 
30  cases  the  men  seem  to  have  been  employed  with  metallic  lead  only, 
and  one  was  in  the  charging  room,  where  in  a  well-managed  factory 
there  should  be  no  danger  from  lead.  As  would  be  expected,  the 
cases  found  by  the  investigators  were  of  a  fairly  serious  or  very 
serious  type.  Mild  cases  do  not  make  much  impression  and  are 
soon  forgotten. 

In  the  present  investigation  cases  of  lead  jDoisoning  were  found 
which  had  occurred  during  the  year  1913  in  all  of  the  following 
processes : 

Casting,  inciudiug  Plante  plates. 

Trimming  and  filing. 

Mixing  oxides. 

Making  paste. 

Pasting  plates. 

Cleaning  pasted  plates. 

Taking  papers  off  pasted  plates. 

Carrying  pasted  i^lates  to  forming  room. 

Polishing  higs. 

Assembling. 

Lead  burning. 

Filling  ironclad  plates  Avitli  dry  oxides. 

SOURCES  OF  INFORMATION  CONCERNING  THE  POISONING. 

The  three  States  in  which  the  greatest  amount  of  storage-battery 
manufacturing  is  done  are  Ohio,  New  York,  and  Pennsylvania,  The 
first  two  require  by  law  that  all  cases  of  industrial  lead  poisoning 
shall  be  reported  to  a  central  office.  A  sunilar  law  in  Pennsylvania 
has  just  come  into  force.  The  reports  from  the  Ohio  Department  of 
Health  proved  to  be  very  nearly  complete,  for  a  careful  search  re- 
vealed only  a  very  few  cases  in  addition  to  those  already  reported. 
In  New  York,  on  the  other  hand,  the  reports  are  far  from  complete, 
and  it  was  necessary  to  question  the  men  themselves  and  interview 
the  physicians  in  order  to  discover  even  approximately  how  much 
lead  poisoning  there  was  during  1913  in  this  industry.  Some  of  the 
physicians  are  careless  about  sending  in  reports,  although  they  are 
able  to  verify  a  case  when  the  record  is  brought  to  them,  and  others 
say  frankly  that  they  do  not  trouble  to  send  in  reports  of  any  but 
the  severe  cases.  The  physicians  attached  to  the  factory,  who 
naturally  see  the  majority  of  cases,  are  not  always  willing  to  make 
public  the  actual  number  of  men  who  have  had  lead  poisoning  in 
the  plant.  In  Philadelphia  it  was  necessary  to  depend  entirely  upon 
hospital  records   and  interviews   with  physicians  because   the  law 


LEAD  POISOXIisTG  IN   MANUFACTURE   OF   STOEAGE   BATTEEIES.       23 


requiring  the  reporting  of  lead  poisoning  has  been  in  effect  so  short 
a  time.  Many  of  the  cases  in  the  lists  are  known  to  the  writer  only 
by  the  name  of  the  man  and  the  name  of  the  physician  who  made  the 
diagnosis.  The  men  had  quit  work  and  could  not  be  traced,  and  it 
was  impossible  to  learn  in  what  process  they  were  employed  or  how 
long  they  worked  before  they  began  to  feel  the  effects  of  the  lead. 
Among  those  who  could  be  approached  a  very  large  majority  were 
employed  as  pasters,  but  it  would  probably  be  wrong  to  conclude 
from  this  that  pastmg  is  as  much  more  dangerous  than  other  kinds 
of  work  as  this  would  indicate.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  pasters  are 
all,  or  almost  all,  foreigners,  and  much  more  likely  to  go  to  dispen- 
saries and  hospitals  for  treatment  than  are  the  American-born  or  at 
least  English-speaking  lead  burners  and  molders. 

NUMBER  OF  CASES  IN  FIVE  LARGE  FACTORIES. 

In  what  follows  the  facts  are  given  as  it  was  possible  to  ascertain 
them,  although  it  is  realized  that  the  information  is  far  from  com- 
plete. Only  the  five  largest  plants  are  considered  here.  The 
force  employed  in  these  five  plants  in  processes  which  involve  the  use 
of  lead  or  lead  salts  numbers  about  915,  and  of  these  about  303 
are  exposed  to  metalMc  lead  dust  and  the  fumes  from  melted  lead, 
274  to  lead  oxides,  and  338  to  both.  They  are  divided  approxi- 
mately as  follows : 

Casting,  sawing,  trimming,  etc 303 

Mixing IG 

Pasting 246 

Lead  burning,  assembling,  polishing  lugs,  etc 338 

Filling  ironclads 12 

Total 915 

The  cases  of  lead  poisoning  which  were  found  to  have  occurred 
during  1913  in  these  five  plants  are  as  follows: 

NUMBER  OF   CASES  OF  LEAD  POISONING  IN  FIVE  LARGE  PLANTS  DURING  1913. 


Number 

employed 

in  lead 

work  in 

five  plants. 

Cases  from 
hospitals 
and  dis- 
pensaries. 

Cases  from 
doctors' 
records. 

Total 
cases. 

Rate  per 
100  em- 
ployees. 

915 

•13 

121 

16i 

17.9 

This  means  that,  with  incomplete  records,  these  five  factories 
had  at  least  one  case  of  lead  poisoning  for  every  five  to  six  men 
employed,  or  17.9  per  100  employed.  When  one  considers  how  scanty 
was  the  information  obtained  in  regard  to  three  of  the  five  plants  and 
how  hard  it  is  to  follow  up  a  shifting  force  of  migratory  foreigners 


24 


BULLETIN    OF    THE   BUEEAU    OF    LABOE    STATISTICS. 


it  is  easy  to  see  thafc  these  figures  must  necessarily  fall  far  below 
the  truth. 

If  these  cases  are  divided  according  to  occupation,  which  can  be 
done  only  in  the  case  of  70,  the  greater  danger  of  work  vrith  the 
oxides  becomes  apparent. 

CASES  or  LEAD  POISONING  CLASSIFIED  AS  TO  CHARACTER  OF  EXPOSURE. 


Character  of  cxiDosure. 


Exposed  to  metallic  dust  and  fumes 

Exposed  to  oxides 

Exposed  to  both  metallic  dust  and  fumes  and  oxides. 


Employees 
exposed. 


Cases  of 

lead 

poisoning. 


303 
274 
338 


Rate  per 
100  em- 
ployees. 


1.0 
14.2 
S.3 


The  same  thing  is  shown  in  some  unusually  full  records  from 
two  plants  which  give  occupation  as  well  as  other  information  in 
regard  to  the  cases  of  lead  poisoning.  In  these  two  the  ca.ses  were 
described  as  follows: 

CASES  OF   LEAD  POISONING    IN  TWO  PLANTS  CLASSIFIED  AS    TO  OCCUPATION    OF 

EMPLOYEES. 


Occupation. 


Casting,  including  Plante 

Mixing,  including  filling  of  ironclads. 

Pasting 

Assembling  and  lead  bmning 


Employees 
exposed. 


177 
20 
160 
262 


Cases  of 

lead 

poisoning. 


Rate  per  100 
employees. 


1.7 
40.0 
19.4 
10.7 


•  This  does  not  cover  all  the  eases  during  1913  in  these  two  plants,  for  in  one  of  them  records  were  avail- 
able for  sLx  months  only. 

In  another  plant  the  physician  showed  a  list  of  men  wdio  had  been 
laid  off  during  three  months'  time  because  they  showed  signs  of  lead 
absorption.     Most  of  these  men  were  simply  suspended  temporarily. 

CASES  OF    LEAD    POISONING    IN  ONE    PLANT    CLASSIFIED    AS    TO   OCCUPATION    OF 

EMPLOYEES. 


Occupation. 


Employees 
exposed. 


Cases  of 

lead 

poisoning. 


Rate  per  100 
employees. 


Casting 

Mixing,  including  filling  of  ironclads,  etc. 

Pasting 

Assembling  and  lead  biKning 


117 

18 

100 

213 


2.6 
33. 3 
18.0 
14.6 


From  all  these  records  it  is  plain  that  mixing,  which  involves 
handling  the  dry  oxides,  is  the  most  dangerous  work.  The  filling  of 
'ironclads"  has  been  included  under  this  headmg  because  in  that 
work,  also,  the  dry  oxides  are  handled.  Next  in  danger  to  mixing 
comes  pasting,   then   assembling  and  burning,   because  in  both   of 


LEAD  POISONING  IN   MANUFACTURE   OF   STOEAGE   BATTERIES.        25 

these  there  is  oxide  dust,  and,  finally;  mucli  less  dangerous  than  any 
of  the  others,  casting  and  trimming,  where  there  is  only  metallic 
lead  or  possibly  some  fumes.  However,  it  may  be  true  that  there 
is  more  lead  poisoning  among  lead  burners  in  these  factories  than 
was  found.  One  physician  said  that  he  had  made  a  careful  surrey 
of  100  men  who  were  employed  in  departments  other  than  pasting 
or  mixing.  They  were  casters,  lead  burners,  and  storeroom  men,  and 
in  20  of  the  hundred  he  found  signs  of  lead  absorption. 

TYPE  OF  LEAD  POISONING. 

Legge  and  Goadby  ^  state  that  during  the  10  years  from  1900  to 
1909,  inclusive,  there  were  285  cases  of  lead  poisoning  in  this  indus- 
try reported  in  Great  Britain,  but  that  a  comparison  of  the  propor- 
tion of  severe  cases  with  the  proportion  among  the  cases  in  all  lead 
industries  shows  that  the  making  of  electric  accumulators  has  less 
than  its  share  of  severe  forms  of  plumbism. 

The  cases  are  usually  acute,  \vith  colic  and  in  severe  instances 
encephalopathy,  but  not  paralysis.  This  is  explained  by  the  fact 
that  men  do  not  remain  long  in  this  kind  of  work  and  that  they  are 
exposed  to  the  dust  of  salts  of  lead  which  is  quickly  absorbed  and 
which  causes  acute  plumbism. 

This  was  also  found  to  be  true  of  the  cases  of  lead  j^oisoning  in  the 
making  of  accumulators  in  the  United  States  concerning  which  the 
writer  has  been  able  to  gather  detailed  information.  Among  64  cases, 
8,  or  12^  per  cent,  would  be  classed  as  severe,  25,  or  39  per  cent, 
as  moderate,  and  31,  or  48.4  per  cent,  as  mild.  This  is  a  larger  pro- 
portion of  moderate  cases  than  that  in  the  British  reports.  There 
the  figures  are:  Severe,  20.6  per  cent;  moderate,  24.9  per  cent;  and 
mild,  53.7  per  cent.^  The  explanation  of  this  difference  is  probably 
that  mild  cases  are  hard  to  trace  in  this  country,  for  they  are  quickly 
forgotten.  Still  this  does  not  mean  that  there  is  always  a  quick 
recovery  from  these  acute  attacks  and  that  the  man  may  go  back  to 
work  after  a  few  days'  illness.  His  incapacitation  for  work  may 
even  be  longer  than  the  employment  which  led  up  to  his  ilhiess. 
For  instance,  the  pasters  in  a  storage-battery  factory  usually  suffer 
from  rapidly  developing  and  uncomphcated  lead  poisoning,  yet  if 
these  men  are  followed  up  it  will  be  seen  that,  simple  and  acute  as  the 
disease  is,  the  effects  are  sometimes  slow  to  disappear.  This  is  the 
record  of  12  such  cases  which  were  looked  up  within  a  year  of  the 
illness. 

1  Lead  Poisoning  and  Lead  Absorption,  London,  1912,  pp.  46,  51. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  IS. 


26 


BULLETIN    OF    THE   BVKEAU    OF   LABOR    STATISTICS. 


IKCAPACITATIOX  OF  12  LEAD-POISONED  EMPLOYEES,  CLASSIFIED  AS  TO 
TIME  EMPLOYED. 


Length  of  time  employed. 

Length  of 
time  inca- 
pacitated. 

8  months 

3  weeks. 

3  weeks. 

4  weeks. 

5  weeks. 
5  weeks. 

2  montlis. 

2  months. 

3  months. 
3  months. 

3  months. 

4  months. 
4  months. 

3  months 

C  months : 

5  months 

2J  months 

3  months 

5  months 

fi  months 

2i-  months 

C  weeks 

6  months 

6  months 

The  s}Tnptoms  of  poisoning  in  most  of  the  cases  investigated  came 
on  rapidly.  Kecords  were  obtamed  of  6  men  who  sickened  after  less 
than  a  month's  exposm-e,  and  3  more  who  had  been  exposed  only  a 
little  over  a  month.  One  man  who  mixed  paste  by  hand  began  to  feel 
ill,  with  loss  of  appetite,  headache,  and  digestive  disturbance,  after  two 
week's  work.  He  was  a  tall  and  strongl}'  budt  man  and  said  that  he 
had  never  been  sick  in  his  life  before,  but  he  was  obhgecl  to  go  to  the 
hospital  at  the  end  of  11  weeks.  A  paster  in  the  same  room  who  had 
had  many  attacks  of  lead  poisoning  and  who  had  just  been  laid  off  by 
the  doctor  for  6  weeks,  said  that  the  men  m  his  room  always  began  to 
feel  ill  at  the  end  of  a  month,  but  they  could  usually  keep  on  working 
for  a  while  longer  and  many  of  them  came  back  again,  even  after  a 
severe  attack,  because  of  the  good  wages  paid. 

The  following  table  gives  the  length  of  time  wliich  elapsed  between 
the  beginning  of  the  work  and  the  first  symptoms  of  lead  poisoning  in 
60  cases.  It  shows  tliat  five-sixths  of  them  were  sickened  after  less 
than  six  months'  work. 

Period  of  exposure  to  lead  before  onset  of  sy/nj)toms  in  60  cases. 

Less  than  1  month G 

1  month  and  less  than  2  months 11 

2  and  less  than  3  months 14 

3  and  less  than  4  months 12 

4  and  less  than  5  months 5 

5  and  less  than  6  months 2 

Total  less  than  G  months 50 

6  and  less  than  7  months 2 

7  and  less  than  8  months 2 

8  and  less  than  9  months 0 

9  and  less  than  10  months 2 

10  and  less  than  11  months 0 

11  and  less  than  12  months 2 

Total,  less  than  1  year 58 

1  to  2  years 1 

4  to  5  years 1 

Total,  over  1  year '2 


LEAD  POISOISI'IiSrG  IIST   MAI^'UFACTUEE   OE   STORAGE'  BATTERIES.       27 

The  symptoms  of  40  cases  of  lead  poisoning  were  reported  in  some 
detail,  and  when  analyzed  reveal  the  following  facts:  Twenty-four 
were  cases  of  typical  lead  cohc ;  9  of  the  other  16  complamed  of  abdomi- 
nal pain,  7  did  not.  In  22  anemia  was  a  marked  feature.  .Li27  there 
was  constipation  and  in  3  diarrhea.  Yomitmg  was  pronounced  in  7, 
persistent  nausea  in  4,  severe  headache  in  9,  in  4  of  which  there 
was  dizziness  also.  Myalgia  was  one  of  the  cliief  symptoms  in  7  cases. 
Twenty-three  out  of  the  40  had  nervous  symptoms.  Five  of  these 
cases  are  noted  as  showmg  "marked  nervousness,"  while  4  had  ''ob- 
stinate insomnia'';  4  had  weakness  of  the  wrists;  3  had  wrist  palsy;  1 
had  a  period  of  unconsciousness  at  the  beginning  of  his  attack  of 
colic;  another  was  taken  with  violent  delirium  while  in  the  hospital 
for  cohc,  and  still  another  had  repeated  attacks  of  an  epileptiform 
character.     In  4  the  physicians  noted  ''mental  duUness." 

Of  these  40  men  15  had  never  been  sick  before  except  for  the 
diseases  of  childhood ;  23  had  had  no  former  attack  of  lead  poisoning, 
5  had  a  history  of  an  earlier  attack,  4  had  had  two  previous  attacks, 
1  had  had  four,  and  7  said  that  they  had  been  sick  many  times. 

The  only  fatal  case  reported  during  1913  was  that  of  a  Polish 
workman  who  had  been  employed  for  about  two  months,  at  what 
particular  process  is  not  known.  According  to  the  statement  of 
the  two  physicians  who  saw  him,  he  was  taken  with  acute  lead 
colic  and  his  friends  advised  him  to  drink  whisky  to  stop  the  pain, 
which  he  did  to  such  an  extent  that  he  developed  acute  alcoholism 
also,  followed  by  delirium  tremens  and  death.  The  death  certificate 
gives  lead  poisonmg,  Avith  acute  alcoholism  as  contributory  cause. 

LEAD  POISONING  IN  THE  INDUSTRY  IN  GREAT  BRITAIN  AND 

GERMANY. 

If  we  compare  the  records  of  cases  of  lead  poisoning  durmg  1913 
in  the  five  large  factories  in  the  United  States  with  the  most  recent 
British  and  German  records,  we  can  see  the  difference  made  by 
careful  sanitary  and  medical  control  of  this  industry. 

The  rate  of  poisoning  in  these  five  factories,  as  shown  by  records 
wliich  are'  far  from  complete,  is  almost  18  for  100  men  employed. 
According  to  Wagener^  the  rate  20  years  ago  in  five  German  facto- 
ries was  14  per  100,  which  even  at  that  time  was  considered  fright- 
fully high  {ersclireckend  lioch) . 

The  attention  of  the  factory  inspectors  was  called  to  lead  poisoning 
in  the  accumulator  works  in  Berlin  as  early  as  1889,  and  as  a  result 
certain  improvements  were  introduced  which  were  gradually  extended* 
to  other  regions,  and  by  1898  the  detailed  regulations  which  are 
now  in  force  were  made  applicable  throughout  Germany.  Their 
effect  is  strikingly  shown  in  the  records  of  several  of  the  large  f actor- 

1  Deutsche  Vierteljahressehrift  fiir  o:Tentliche  Gesundheitspneiro,  1902,  vol.  .34,  p.  533. 


28 


BULLETIX    OF    THE    BUEEAU    OP    LABOE    STATISTICS. 


ies.  For  instance,  the  German  Factory  Inspection  Report  for  1912  ^ 
contains  the  history  of  lead  poisoning  in  a  single  large  factory  in  the 
Arnsberg  district  as  follows: 

CASES  OF  DEAD  POISONING  AMONG    EMPLOYEES  IN  ONE  FACTORY  IN  GERMANY, 

BY  YEARS,  1S97  TO  1912. 


Number 

Cases  of  lead  poisoning. 

Year. 

Number 
employed 

in  lead 
processes. 

Cases  of  lead  poisoning! 

Year. 

employed 

in  load 
processes. 

Number. 

Rate  per 
100  em- 
ployees. 

Number. 

Rate  per 
100  em- 
ployees. 

1S97 

189 
237 
316 
298 
237 
216 
263 
374 

40 
18 
9 
6 
3 
5 
5 
8 

21.16 
7.59 
2.85 
2.01 
1.27 
2.31 
1.90 
2.14 

1905 

419 
465 
461 
426 
411 
379 
408 
411 

S 
6 

0 

3 

4 
5 
4 

1. 91 

1898. . 

1906     .   . 

1  51 

1899 

1907 

1.-30 

1900 

1908 

1.17 

1901 

1909 

1910 

.73 

1902.. 

1  05 

1903...- 

1911 

191' 

1.23 

1904 

.97 

The  effect  of  the  regulations  wliich  came  into  force  in  May,  1808, 
is  shown  clearlj'  in  this  table. 

Here  is  a  1)ri?f  resume  of  the  regulations  for  the  control  of  this 
industr}-  in  Cierman\  :  - 

Adequate  ventilation:  floors  impervious  to  water,  not  made  of 
wood,  or  linoleum,  or  soft  cement  in  am'  room  in  whicli  lead  is  handled. 
Walls  smootli,  coA^ered  with  wash.able  paint  or  wliitewashed  once  a 
3'ear. 

Casting,  pohshing,  and  pasting  each  in  a  separate  room. 

Hoods  over  melting  pot  and  over  lead  burning.  No  lead  dust  to 
be  allowed  to  escape  in  the  course  of  cutting  and  polishing. 

Hoods  with  exhaust  over  paste  mixing  and  pasting. 

Floors  to  )''e  cleaned  with  water  twice  a  da}'. 

Separate  lunch  r-ooms,  separate  dressing  and  wash  rooms,  wash- 
ing to  be  compulsory,  ore  bath  a  week.  Work  clothes  to  be  provided 
consisting  of  a  full  suit  and  cap.  Soap,  towels,  and  brushes  to  be 
provided. 

Xo  women  or  minors  to  be  employed. 

Pasters  and  mixers  to  be  allowed  to  work  onh'  eight  hours  a  daj^ 
witli  an  hour  and  a  half  for  lunch,  or  six  continuous  hours.  Medical 
inspection  once  a  month. 

Some  factories  go  beyond  even  these  recjuirements.  Thus  the 
Hagen  factorv  '  furnishes  milk  free  of  cost  to  the  workmen.  It  is 
probably  tJie  model  factory  of  this  kind  in  the  A\-orld  and  without 
going  into  detail  the  most  important  features  maybe  noted.  All  the 
pig  lead  for  the  casting  Icettles  is  handled  with  gbves,  and  no  case  of 

1  Jahrcstaerichte  dor  Gewerbe  aufsichtsbeamten  und  Bergebehorden  fur  das  Jahr  1912,  vol.  1,  p.  435. 

2  Wagener,  Deutsche  Vierteljahresschriftfuroffentliche  Gesundheitspflege,  1902,  vol.  34,  pp.  536-538. 

■'■  Jaiiresbericlite  der  Gewerbe  aufsichtsbeamten  und  Bergbehorden  fiir  das  Jahr  1912,  vol.  l,p.  436.  Also 
InauguralDisscrtatinn.  Eric  Pagels,  Leipzig,  1910. 


LEAD  POISONIISTG  IN  MANUFACTUEE   OF   STORAGE  BATTERIES.       29 

lead  poisoning  lias  occuiTcd  thus  far  among  the  men  who  transport 
pig  lead  or  kegs  of  oxides  or  collect  dross  and  refuse  lead.  Much  of 
the  casting  is  rendered  less  dangerous  by  the  use  of  machinery,  l)ut 
there  arc  still  occasional  cases  of  plumb  ism  among  the  fmishers  and 
trimmers  of  castings. 

In  mixing;  the  oxides  are  dumped  mechanically  into  a  closed  mixer 
provided  with  an  exhaust,  and  here  also  the  liquid  constituents  of  the 
paste  are  added  and  the  paste  is  mixed  in  this  sam^o  machine.  Only 
negative  plates  are  pasted;  the  positive  are  Plante  plates  and  the 
paste  for  the  former  is  applied,  not  ])j  hand  but  by  machine. 

In  lead  burning,  the  temperature  caused  by  the  flame  is  said  not 
to  be  over  550°  C.  (1022°  F.).  The  danger  here  is  thought  to  be 
from  dust  and  the  workbenclies  in  the  assembling  and  lead-burning 
room  are  covered  with  fine  wire  netting  which  :illows  the  dust  to  fall 
through  and  be  caught  in  a  space  below. 

All  the  floors  are  of  smooth,  impervious  material — cement  or  zinc — 
and  are  thoroughly  wet  before  they  are  swept.  The  only  respirators 
in  use  consist  of  light,  aluminum  frames  with  thin  layers  of  cotton 
slipped  in  and  with  a  valve  to  let  out  the  exlialed  air.  The  men  are 
given  15  minutes  at  noon  and  evening  to  wash  and  to  change  their 
clothes,  and  there  are  attendants  in  charge  of  the  lavatories  whose 
duty  it  is  to  see  that  the  men  rinse  their  mouths,  brush  their  teeth, 
and  subject  their  hands  and  nails  to  thorough  scrubbing  with  soap. 
The  physician  in  charge  emphasizes  the  importance  of  care  of  the 
mouth  and  teeth  and  says  that  it  has  an  influence  in  preventing  the 
development  of  the  lead  line.  The  men  who  mix  the  paste  and  those 
who  apply  it  take  two  baths  a  week,  all  others  take  one. 

Medical  examination  of  the  men  is  made  weekly  instead  of  monthly, 
and  ever  since  1908  a  chemist  has  been  emplo3'ed  to  examine  the 
blood  of  all  men  who  are  suspected  of  lead  poisoning.  The  blood  is 
examined  for  the  presence  of  basophilic  granules  in  the  red  corpuscles, 
and  if  as  many  as  200  out  of  1,000,000  red  corpuscles  are  found  to  be 
thus  affected,  the  man  is  suspended  from  any  work  with  lead  until 
his  blood  is  normal  again.  Between  190S  and  1912,  85  suspected 
men  have  been  examined  and  about  half  have  shown  this  change  in 
the  blood.  In  some  cases  the  number  of  degenerated  corpuscles 
reached  2-1,000  per  million. 

The  physician  in  this  factory  has  described  his  method  of  examin- 
ation as  follows:  Each  week  the  men  pass- before  him  and  he  inspects 
the  tongue  and  gums,  tests  the  strength  of  the  hands,  and  also  exam- 
ines them  closely  for  traces  of  lead  on  the  skin.  When  the  man  shows 
evidence  of  carelessness  in  washing,  the  doctor  applies  a  solution  of 
0.4  per  cent  sodium  sulphide,  which  by  blackening  the  deposits  of 
lead  serves  as  a  valuable  object  lesson  to  the  man.  He  questions  the 
man  as  to  his  health,  makes  a  note  of  pallor,  of  fibrillary  twitchings 


30 


BITLLETIX    OP    THE   UX'EEAU    OF    LABOE    STATISTICS. 


of  the  muscles  of  face  and  forearms,  and  if  he  has  the  least  suspicion 
that  the  man  shows  signs  of  lead  absorption  he  orders  a  blood  exam- 
ination and  on  the  outcome  of  that  decides  whether  or  not  the  man 
must  be  taken  away  from  leadwork  and  put  into  some  safe  place,  such 
as  the  carpenter  shop.  He  makes  it  a  rule  that  the  men  in  the  most, 
dangerous  parts  of  the  factory  must  be  changed  to  outdoor  work  for 
a  week  and  then  back  again,  since  he  finds  that  this  change  improves 
the  blood  count  and  lessens  the  number  of  granulated  red  blood  cor- 
puscles. This  physician  emphasizes  the  importance  of  giving  verbal 
mstructions  to  the  men,  which  he  says  are  worth  far  more  than  any 
number  of  written  regulations. 

iUl  of  these  measures  are  amply  justified  by  the  excellent  report  as 
to  lead  poisoning  for  this  factory.  The  record  given  on  page  28  of  the 
large  factory  in  the  Arnsberg  district  belongs  to  the  Hagen  works. 

There  is  no  statement  in  the  German  report  as  to  lead  poisoning 
throughout  the  whole  industr}'  in  that  country,  but  the  British  An- 
nual Report  of  the  Chief  Inspector  of  Factories  and  Workshops  for  the 
year  1912  has  a  record  of  all  the  cases  of  lead  poisoning  in  the  making 
of  electric  accumulators  in  Great  Britam.  In  1911  the  approximate 
number  of  men  cmploj'ed  in  processes  which  involve  exposure  to 
lead  was  1,149  and  the  number  of  cases  of  lead  poisoning  reported 
was  24,  with  1  fatality,  which  would  mean  an  attack  rate  j^er  100 
employed  of  2.1.  There  was  a  notable  increase,  absolute  and  rela- 
tive, m  1912;  the  number  employed  was  1,254,  and  there  were  38 
cases,  with  1  fatality,^  a  rate  of  3  per  100.  The  inspectors  call  atten- 
tion to  this  mcrease  and  urge  that  exhaust  ventilation  be  requhed 
to  carry  off  the  fumes  from  lead  burning  and  the  dust  caused  by 
filuig  and  trimming. 

There  is  an  interestmg  detailed  report  of  the  examination  of  the 
men  employed  in  one  EngUsh  factory.-  The  figures  given  do  not 
represent  cases  classed  as  lead  poisoning,  but  simply  men  who  showed 
undoubted  marks  of  lead  absorption. 

CASES  OF  LEAD  ABSORPTIOX  AMOXG  EMPLOYEES  IN  OXE  FACTORY  IX  EXGLAXD, 

BY  OCCUPATIONS. 


Occupation. 

% 

Number  of 
employees 
examined. 

Employees 
showing 
marks  of 
lead  ab- 
sorption. 

Rate  per 
100  em- 
ployees. 

Casting 

28 
27 
16 
19 

20 

16 

24 

4 
6 
5 

7 

9 

3 
5 

14 

Pasting 

22 

■Rnrminp- 

31 

Tipad  hiiming 

37 

Filing r 

Finishing 

31 

Cleaning" 

Packing 

19 

others 

21 

Total 

159 

39 

24.5 

1  Great  Britain. 

2  r)>id.,  p.  201. 


Annual  Report  of  the  Inspector  of  Factories,  1912,  p.  205. 


LEAD  POISOXIXG  IX   MAjSTUrACTUEE   OF   STOEAGE   BATTEEIES.        31 

It  is  easy  to  see  from  this  report  why  the  dangers  of  lead  buriiino^ 
and  finishing  were  so  apparent  to  the  inspectors.  The  process  of 
ptisting  and  of  mixing  the  paste,  which  with  lis  is  the  most  dangerous 
of  all,  has  been  well  controlled  in  England  and  docs  not  cause  nearly 
as  much  trouble  as  the  comparatiyely  safer  work  of  lead  burning. 

In  1910  visits  were  paid  to  two  large  accumulator  factories  in  the 
city  of  London.  As  the  vigilance  of  the  factory  inspectors  has  brought 
about  various  improvements  during  the  last  four  years  in  British 
factories  of  this  l-dnd,  it  is  probable  that  some  of  the  featm-es  which 
were  noted  at  the  time  of  these  visits  as  being  open  to  criticism  have 
since  been  corrected.  On  the  whole  even  in  1910  conditions  were 
superior  in  these  factories  to  those  in  our  own,  chiefly  because  of 
better  supervision  of  the  men  at  work,  greater  personal  care  of  the 
employees,  and  better  housekeeping.  We  shaU  mention  only  the 
most  important  features  in  these  factories.  The  casting  rooms  had 
in  both  instances  hooded  kettles  provided  mth  exhausts.  In  one 
the  kettles  were  further  protected  by  sliding  panels  of  iron  which 
could  be  open  or  closed  according  to  the  draft  in  the  room.  The 
surface  of  the  lead  in  the  kettles  was  covered  with  charcoal  to  prevent 
the -formation  of  skim  or  dross.  The  Home  Ofiicc  assumes  that  lead 
fumes  or  oxide  dust  ma}^  escape  from  molten  lead  no  matter  how  low 
the  temperature,  and  therefore  insists  on  hoods  for  the  kettles. 

In  both  factories  the  mixing  rooms  in  which  also  the  paste  was 
made  were  quite  separate;  the  floors  were  of  cement,  kept  moist,  and 
cleaned  by  flushing.  The  mixing  was  done  under  an  exhaust  draft 
in  a  closed  machine,  and  the  men  at  work  wore  respirators  which  in 
England  consist  of  muslin  bags  tied  over  the  mouth  and  nose.  The 
scales  on  which  the  ingredients  were  weighed  were  also  protected  by 
a  hood  with  an  exhaust.  In  one  factory  2  men  were  emploj^ed  at 
mixing;  in  the  other  14  took  turns  at  it,  2  working  at  a  time.  Xeithor 
room  was  entirely  dust  free. 

The  paste  was  given  out  to  the  pasters,  who  worked  in  a  room  in 
which  no  other  process  was  carried  on.  These  rooms  were  large  with 
cement  floor,  kept  continually  wet.  The  pasters  stood  on  boards  to 
keep  their  feet  dry.  The  workbejiches  were  covered  with  sheet  lead 
and  protected  by  a  raised  edge  to  keep  the  paste  from  falling  to  the 
floor.  The  men  were  furnished  ^vith  full  suits  of  overalls,  oilcloth 
or  leather  aprons,  and  heavy  leather  gloves. 

In  both  factories  the  drjdng  room  was  open  to  criticism  because 
of  the  fine  dust  on  floors  and  sh-elves.  It  was  said  that  they  were 
flushed  out  once  a  week. 

In  the  forming  rooms  they  had  a  way  of  drawing  off  the  acid 
entirely  before  the  plates  were  taken  out,  which  added  to  the  comfort 
of  the  workmen  removing  the  plates. 


32  BULLETIJ^r   OF   THE   BUREAU   OF   LAEOK   STATISTICS. 

Assembling  and  load  burning  were  at  tliat  time  carried  on  just  as 
in  American  factories,  with  no  special  precautions  against  dust  or 
fumes,  because,  as  was  explained  by  the  factory  inspector,  these  proc- 
esses were  not  supposed  to  be  attended  with,  danger.  As  we  have 
akeady  noted,  there  has  been  a  change  of  opinion  since  then  and  an 
effort  is  to  be  made  to  carry  off  the  fumes  and  prevent  the  dust. 

As  is  usual  in  British  factories,  the  lavatories  in  these  two  con- 
formed to  the  strict  letter  of  the  law,  but  were  not  luxurious.  They 
were,  however,  entirely  adequate.  The  men  exposed  to  lead  are 
required  to  take  a  bath  once  a  week.  There  were  large  lunch  rooms, 
p.nd  no  food  might  be  kept  or  eaten  in  any  other  room,  nor  were  any 
of  the  men  allowed  to  enter  the  lunch  room  before  taking  off  their 
overalls  and  washing. 

Medical  inspection  was  monthly  in  one,  every  three  weeks  in  the 
other.  In  the  larger  of  the  two  factories,  between  80  and  100 
men  came  in  contact  with  lead  in  castmg,  mixing,  pasting,  and 
drying.  There  had  been  no  case  of  lead  poisoning  discovered 
among  them  during  the  preceding  year.  Here,  as  in  the  German 
factory,  a  man  engaged  in  lead  work  who  seemed  indisposed  was 
given  a  job  in  the  open  air  temporarily.  This  company  sold  tooth- 
brushes to  the  men  at  twopence  halfpenny  apiece,  and  if  the  man 
failed  to  use  his  toothbrush,  if  his  teeth  were  persistently  dirty,  he 
was  discharged. 

The  British  special  rules  for  the  making  of  electric  accumulators 
are  published  in  full  in  the  appendix;  essentially  they  are  the  same 
as  the  German.^ 

The  German  rate  of  lead  j)oisoning  in  tliis  industry,  or  rather  that 
of  the  greatest  German  factory,  is  less  than  1  per  100  men  employed, 
and  the  British  rate  is  about  3  per  100  employed.  The  rate  in  our 
five  largest  factories  is  almost  18  per  100  employed,  and  this  great 
difference  must  be  explamed  by  the  neglect  in  this  countiy  of  factory 
sanitation  and  of  personal  care  of  the  men  employed.  No  new 
legislation  is  needed  to  bring  about  reforms  in  this  industry;  the 
laws  of  Ohio,  New  York,  and  Pennsylvania  are  quite  adequate.  It 
is  a  c[uestion  of  adequate  enforcenaent. 

SUMMARY. 

The  ordinary  storage  batter}^,  not  the  Edison,  consists  of  plates  of 
lead,  or  of  lead  grids  covered  with  a  lead  oxide  paste.  In  the  prep- 
aration of  these  plates  and  grids  the  workmen  are  exposed  to  the 

1  The  French  law  of  October  1, 1913,  covers  establishments  in  which  storage  batteries  are  manufactured. 
The  regulations,  which  are  given  in  the  appendix,  are  similar  to  the  German  and  British,  but  there  is  one 
specially  good  section  which  requires  that  men  who  apply  for  employment  in  an  accumulator  factory  must 
bo  examined  hy  a  physician  and  that  they  can  not  continue  to  work  without  obtaining  a  second  certificate 
of  good  health  at  the  end  of  the  fu-st  month,  and  after  that,  at  the  end  of  every  three  months.  The  exam- 
ining physician  is  paid  b}^  the  company. 


LEAD  POIS0Iv'I]N"G  IN  MAXUFACTUEE  OF   STOEAGE  BATTERIES.       33 

dtmger  of  lead  poisoning  through  dust  of  metalHc  lead  and  tlu'ough 
fumes  from  melted  lead. 

In  making  and  applying  the  paste  the  workmen  are  exposed  to 
still  greater  danger  of  poisoning  from  the  oxides  of  lead. 

The  subsequent  processes  of  assembhng,  lead  burning,  etc.,  involve 
exposure  to  the  fumes  of  melted  lead  and  to  the  dust  from  dried 
oxide  paste. 

These  dangers  can  be  obviated  by  installing  hoods  and  exhausts  to 
carry  off  fumes  and  dust,  by  substituting  machine  for  hand  work, 
by  providing  ample  washing  facilities  for  the  workmen  and  insisting  on 
strict  cleanliness  on  their  part,  by  providing  a  separate  lunch  room 
as  the  only  place  where  food  may  be  kept  and  eaten,  and  by  keeping 
the  premises  where  the  work  is  carried  on  clean  and  free  from  dust. 

Inasmuch  as  some  risk  always  remains  after  all  possible  precautions 
have  been  taken,  there  should  be  thorough  medical  supervision  of  the 
men  in  order  to  detect  and  eliminate  those  who  are  oversusceptible 
to  lead,  to  discover  cases  in  the  early  stages,  and  to  give  instractions 
to  the  men  on  the  care  of  themselves. 

By  using  precautions  such  as  these,  German  and  British  employei"s 
have  greatly  reduced  the  amount  of  lead  poisoning  in  factories  of 
this  kind.  In  the  largest  German  factory  the  rate  of  poisoning  m 
1912  was  0.97  per  100  employed,  and  in  Great  Britain  the  rate  for  all 
factories  "during  this  same  year  was  3  per  100. 

In  the  United  States  the  five  largest  factories  were  during  1913 
employing  about  915  men  in  work  which  exposed  them  to  lead.  It 
has  been  possible  to  discover  164  cases  of  lead  poisoning  which 
occurred  among  the  employees  of  these  plants  m  this  one  year.  This 
makes  a  rate  of  17.9  per  100  employed. 

The  largest  proportion  of  lead  poisoning  occurred  among  the  men 
handling  lead  oxides,  the  lowest  among  those  handling  met^Uic  lead 
only.  The  disease  was  usually  typical  acute  lead  poisoning,  with 
gastric  symptoms  predominating,  but  even  an  acute  attack  often 
resulted  in  incapacitation  from  work  lasting  for  several  Aveeks  to  two 
months  or  over.  Out  of  40  cases  23  had  marked  nervous  symptoms. 
Chronic  plumbism  was  rarely  found,  since  the  men  hardly  ever  remain 
long  at  the  work. 

The  employees  in  this  industry  in  the  United  States  are  for  the 
gi-eater  part  of  foreigTi  birth;  many  speak  no  English  and  are  ignorant 
of  the  dangers  of  the  work,  or  if  they  recognize  the  danger,  do  not  know 
how  to  protect  themselves  against  it. 

The  difference  between  the  American  rate  of  lead  poisoning  and  tlie 

British  and  German  rates  must  be  explained  by  the  different  standards 

of  sanitation  and  management  in  this  country  as  compared  with  those 

of  European-countries.     None  of  the  five  large  factories  in  the  United 

73764°— Bull.  165—15 3 


34  BULLETIX   OF    THE   BUEEAU    OF    LABOE   STATISTICS. 

States  comes  up  to  the  British,  or  German  estabhshments  in  cleanH- 
ness  or  in  the  removal  of  fumes  and  dust,  and  only  one  provides  as 
careful  medical  supervision.  Smaller  factories  in  this  country  are 
even  less  well  managed. 

The  three  States  in  which  the  five  largest  factories  are  situated 
have  ahead  y  passed  laws  which  cover  this  industry  and  provide  safe- 
guards for  the  men  engaged  in  it,  and  if  these  laws  are  strictly  enforced 
by  intelligent  factory  inspectors  there  is  no  reason  why  our  record  of 
lead  poisoning  should  not  fall,  as  it  has  fallen  under  intelhgent  super- 
vision in  Great  Britain  and  Germany. 


APPENDIX  A.— REGULATIONS   IN    GREAT   BRITAIN   FOR  THE 
MANUFACTURE  OF  ELECTRIC  ACCUMULATORS.^ 

Whereas  the  manufacture  of  electric  accumulators  lias  been  certified  in  pursuance 
of  section  79  of  the  Factory  and  Workshop  Act,  1901,  to  be  dangerous; 

I  hereby,  in  pursuance  of  the  powers  conferred  on  me  by  that  act,  make  the  following 
regulations,  and  direct  that  they  shall  apply  to  all  factories  and  workshops  or  parts 
thereof  in  which  electric  accumulators  are  manufactured. 

In  these  regulations  "lead  process"  means  pasting,  casting,  lead  burning,  or  any 
work  involving  contact  with  dry  compounds  of  lead. 

Any  approval  given  by  the  chief  inspector  of  factories  in  pursuance  of  these  regula- 
tions shall  be  given  in  writing,  and  may  at  any  time  be  revoked  by  notice  in  writing 
signed  by  him. 

Duties  of  occupier . 

1.  Every  room  in  which  casting,  pasting,  or  lead  burning  is  carried  on  shall  contain 
at  least  500  cubic  feet  of  air  space  for  each  person  employed  therein,  and  in  computing 
this  air  space,  no  height  above  14  feet  shall  be  taken  into  account. 

These  rooms  and  that  in  which  the  plates  are  formed  shall  be  capable  of  thorough 
ventilation.     They  shall  be  pro\-ided  with  windows  made  to  open. 

2.  Each  of  the  following  processes  shall  be  carried  on  in  such  manner  and  under 
such  conditions  as  to  secure  effectual  separation  fi'om  one  another  and  from  any  other 
process. 

(a)  Manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead ; 
(6)  Pasting; 

(c)  Formation  and  lead  burning  necessarily  carried  on  therewith; 
{d)  Melting  down  of  old  plates. 
Provided,  That  manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead  carried  on  as  in  regulation  5 
(6)  need  not  be  separated  from  pasting. 

3 .  The  floors  of  the  rooms  in  which  manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead  or  pasting 
is  carried  on  shall  be  of  cement  or  similar  impervious  material,  and  shall  be  kept  con- 
stantly moist  while  work  is  being  done. 

The  floors  of  these  rooms  shall  be  washed  with  a  hose  pipe  daily. 

4 .  Every  melting  pot  shall  be  covered  with  a  hood  and  shaft  so  arranged  as  to  remove 
the  fumes  and  hot  air  from  the  workrooms. 

Lead  ashes  and  old  plates  shall  be  kept  in  receptacles  .specially  provided  for  the 
purpose.  ■ 

5.  Manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead  in  the  mixing  of  the  paste  or  other  pro- 
cesses shall  not  be  done  except  (a)  in  an  apparatus  so  closed  or  so  arranged  ^\T.th  an 
exhaust  draft  as  to  prevent  the  escape  of  dust  into  the  workroom;  or  (6)  at  a  bench 
provided  with  (1)  efficient  exhaust  draft  and  air  guide  so  arranged  as  to  draw  the 
dust  away  from  the  worker,  and  (2)  a  grating  on  which  each  receptacle  of  the  com- 
pound of  lead  in  use  at  the  time  shall  stand . 

6.  The  benches  at  which  pasting  is  done  shall  be  covered  with  sheet  lead  or  other 
imper\T.ous  material,  and  shall  have  raised  edges. 

7.  No  woman,  young  person,  or  child  shall  be  employed  in  the  manipulation  of  dry 
compounds  of  lead  or  in  pasting. 

8.  (a)  A  duly  qualified  medical  practitioner  (in  these  regulations  refeired  to  as  the 
"appointed  surgeon")  who  may  be  the  certifying  surgeon,  shall  be  appointed  by  the 
occupier,  such  appointment  unless  held  by  the  certifj-ing  surgeon  to  be  subject  to  the 
approval  of  the  chief  inspector  of  factories. 

(6)  Every  person  employed  in  a  lead  process  shall  be  examined  once  a  month  by  the 
appointed  surgeon,  who  shall  have  power  to  suspend  from  employment  in  any  lead 
process. 

(c)  No  person  after  such  suspension  shall  be  employed  in  a  lead  process  without 
written  sanction  entered  in  the  health  register  by  the  appointed  surgeon.     It  shall  be 

1  Factory  and  workshop  acts.  Dangerous  and  unhealthy  industries.  Regulations  and  Special  Rules 
in  force  on  1st  January,  190S.  London,  1907,  p.  7.  [Regulations,  dated  November  2i,  1903,made  by  the 
secretary  of  state  for  the  manufacture  of  electric  accumulators.] 

35 


36  BULLETIX    OF    THE    BUEEAU    OF    LABOR    STATISTICS. 

sufficient  compliance  vidth.  this  regulation  for  a  written  certificate  to  be  given  by  the 
appointed  surgeon  and  attached  to  the  health  register,  such  certificate  to  be  replaced 
by  a  proper  entry  in  the  health  register  at  the  appointed  surgeon's  next  -visit. 

(d)  A  health  register  in  a  form  approved  by  the  chief  inspector  of  factories  shall  be 
kept,  and  shall  contain  a  list  of  all  persons  employed  in  lead  processes.  The  appointed 
surgeon  will  enter  in  the  health  register  the  dates  and  results  of  his  examinations  of  the 
persons  employed  and  particulars  of  any  directions  given  by  him.  He  shall  on  a  pre- 
scribed form  furnish  to  the  chief  inspector  of  factories  on  the  1st  day  of  January  in  each 
year  a  list  of  the  persons  suspended  by  him  during  the  previous  year,  the  cause  and 
duration  of  such  suspension,  and  the  number  of  examinations  made. 

The  health  register  shall  be  produced  at  any  time  when  required  by  H.  il.  inspectors 
of  factories  or  by  the  certifying  surgeon  or  by  the  appointed  surgeon. 

9.  Overalls  shall  be  provided  for  all  persons  employed  in  manipulating  dry  com- 
pounds of  lead  or  in  pasting. 

The  overalls  shall  be  washed  or  renewed  once  cA-ery  week. 

10.  The  occupier  shall  provide  and  maintain — 

(a)  A  cloakroom  In  which  workers  can  deposit  clothing  put  off  during  working 
hours.  Separate  and  suitable  an'angements  shall  be  made  for  the  storage 
of  the  overalls  requii-ed  in  regulation  9. 

(h)  A  dining  room  unless  the  factory  is  closed  dming  meal  hours. 

11.  No  person  shall  be  allowed  to  introduce,  keep,  prepare,  or  partake  of  any  food, 
drink,  or  tobacco,  in  any  room  in  which  a  lead  process  is  caiTied  on.  Suitable  pro- 
visions shall  be  made  for  the  deposit  of  food  brought  by  the  workers. 

This  regulation  shall  not  apply  to  any  sanitary  drink  provided  by  the  occupier  and 
approved  by  the  appointed  surgeon. 

12.  The  occupier  shall  provide  and  maintain  for  the  use  of  the  persons  employed  in 
lead  processes  a  lavatory,  with  soap,  nailbrushes,  toAvels,  and  at  least  one  lavatory 
basin  for  every  five  such  persons.  Each  such  basin  shall  be  provided  with  a  wa.'^te 
pipe,  or  the  basins  shall  be  placed  on  a  trough  fitted  with  a  waste  pipe.  There  shall  be 
a  constant  supply  of  hot  and  cold  Avater  laid  on  to  each  basin. 

Or,  in  the  place  of  basins  the  occupier  shall  provide  and  maintain  troughs  of  enamel 
or  similar  smooth  impervious  material,  in  good  repair,  of  a  total  length  of  2  feet  for 
every  five  persons  employed,  fitted  withAvaste  pipes,  and  without  plugs,  A\-ith  a  suffi- 
cient supply  of  Avarm  water  constantly  aA-ailable. 

The  lavatory  shall  be  kept  thoroughly  cleansed  and  shall  be  supplied  A\-ith  a  suffi- 
cient quantity  of  clean  towels  once  every  day. 

13.  Before  each  meal  and  before  the  end  of  the  day's  Avork,  at  least  10  minutes,  in 
addition  to  the  regular  meal  times,  shall  be  alloAved  for  washing  to  each  person  AA^ho  has 
been  employed  in  the  manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead  or  in  pasting: 

Provided,  That  if  the  lavatory  accommodation  specially  reserved  for  such  persons 
exceeds  that  requh-ed  by  regulation  12,  the  time  alloAvarice  may  be  proportionately 
reduced,  and  that  if  there  be  one  basin  or  2  feet  of  trough  for  each  such  person  this 
regulation  shall  not  apply. 

14.  Sufficient  bath  accommodation  shall  be  provided  for  all  jiersons  engaged  in  the 
manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead  or  in  pasting,  with  hot  and  cold  water  laid  on, 
and  a  sufficient  supply  of  soap  and  toAvels. 

This  rule  shall  not  apply  if  in  consideration  of  the  special  circumstances  of  any  par- 
ticular case  the  chief  inspector  of  factories  approA-es  the  use  of  local  public  baths 
Avhen  conveniently  near,  under  the  conditions  (if  any)  named  in  such  approval. 

15.  The  floors  and  benches  of  each  workroom  shall  be  thoroughly  cleansed  daily, 
at  a  time  when  no  other  Avork  is  being  earned  on  in  the  room. 

Duties  of  persons  employed. 

16.  All  persons  employed  in  lead  processes  shall  present  themselves  at  the  appointed 
times  for  examination  by  the  appointed  surgeon  as  pro  Abided  in  regulation  8. 

No  person  after  suspension  shall  work  in  a  lead  process,  in  any  factory  or  Avorkshop 
in  Avliich  electric  accumulators  are  manufactured,  without  Avritten  sanction  entered  in 
the  health  register  by  the  appointed  surgeon. 

17.  Every  person  employed  in  the  manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead  or  in 
pasting  shall  AA^ear  the  OA'eralls  provided  under  regulation  9.  The  overalls,  when  not 
being  worn,  and  clotliing  put  off  dming  working  hours,  shall  be  deposited  in  the  places 
proAdded  under  regulation  10. 

18.  No  person  shall  introduce,  keep,  prepare,  or  partake  of  any  food,  drink  (other 
than  any  sanitaiy  drink  provided  by  the  occupier  and  approA^ed  by  the  appointed 
surgeon),  or  tobacco  in  any  room  in  which  a  lead  process  is  canied  on. 


LEAD  POISONIXG  lis    MAXUFACTUEE   OF   STOEAGE   BATTEEIES.       37 

19.  No  person  employed  in  a  lead  process  shall  leave  the  premises  or  partake  of 
raeals  without  previously  and  carefully  cleaning  and  washing  the  hands. 

20.  Every  person  employed  in  the  manipulation  of  dry  compounds  of  lead  rr  in 
pasting  shall  take  a  bath  at  least  once  a  week. 

21 .  No  person  shall  in  any  way  Interfere,  without  the  concun-ence  of  the  occupier  or 
manager,  with  the  means  and  appliances  provided  for  the  removal  of  the  dust  or 
fumes,  and  for  the  caixying  out  of  these  regulations. 

These  regulations  shall  come  into  force  on  the  1st  day  of  January,  1904. 

A.   Akers-Douglas, 
One  of  His  Majesty's  Principal 

Sccreto.Tiies  of  State. 
IlOME  Office,  "Whitehall, 

£lst  November,  1903. 


APPENDIX  B.— GENERAL  PROVISIONS  OF  THE  FRENCH  LAW 
GOVERNING  THE  MANUFACTURE  OF  ELECTRIC  ACCUMU- 
LATORS.^ 

The  kettles  for  melted  lead  must  be  kept  in  separate  well-venti- 
lated rooms,  and  efficient  air  exhausts  must  be  provided. 

Work  with  lead  oxides  must  be  done  wet  as  far  as  possible.  When 
this  is  not  practicable,  it  must  be  carried  on  mechanically  in  a  closed 
apparatus,  or  if  the  oxides  must  be  handled,  then  the  work  must  be 
done  under  a  strong  exhaust;  if  this  is  impossible,  the  workmen  m.ust 
be  given  respirators. 

Mixing  must  be  done  in  a  sej^arate  room.  No  dr}'  oxides  may  be 
handled  in  rooms  where  other  work  is  done. 

Oxides,  dry  or  wet,  must  never  be  handled  with  bared  hands. 
The  employer  must  provide  proper  tools  or  impermeable  gloves. 

The  tables  on  which  the  paste  is  handled  must  be  covered  with 
impermeable  material  and  kept  in  good  condition. 

The  floor  must  be  of  impermeable  material  and  kej)t  always 
damp.     Tables,  floor,  and  walls  must  he  washed  at  least  once  a  week. 

Overalls  must  be  provided  and  maintained  in  good  condition. 

No  food  is  to  be  carried  into  the  workroom.  Separate  dressmg 
and  wash  rooms  must  be  provided  with  sufficient  washing  facilities, 
soap*  one  clean  towel  a  week  for  each  man,  and  a  locker  for  each  man's 
clothes;  a  weekly  warm  bath,  tub  or  shower,  must  be  provided. 
For  specified  workers  a  dailj'  warm  bath  must  be  provided. 

Before  employment  a  man  must  undergo  a  medical  examination 
to  show  that  he  is  not  suffering  from  any  disease  which  would 
make  his  employment  in  such  work  dangerous.  At  the  end  of  the 
first  month  he  must  undergo  a  similar  examination,  and  after  that 
at  three-month  intervals.  A  medical  register  must  be  kept  of  all 
the  men  employed. 

1  Bulletin  de  I'lnspcction  du  Travail  et  de  I'HygieDe  Industrielle,  1913,  Nos.  5  and  G,  pages  421  to  424. 
38 

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